Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Thursday, November 25, 2010
EX-MAS
© 11/21/2006, 11/25/10. All rights reserved.
(The following was submitted to Richmond "Style Weekly" at least twice, but no reply was ever received from editor Scott Bass, who seems congenitally unable to respond as a normal, polite human being.)
Well, it is about that time of the year again. No, I don’t mean the raging guilt-trip that drives the Christmas-shopping bus! I am referring to the predictable whinging about the loss of the “true meaning of Christmas” that descends upon us less-than-thou each December harder than Brenda Lee’s recurrent, incessant bleating to go “Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree.”
The Saints Among Us just cannot restrain themselves from casting righteous blame upon us heathens for gleefully contributing to the loss of said “true meaning” with our incessant secularization of what is deemed almost exclusively a Christian holy event. In order to prove it, they rant in high dudgeon about the renaming of the “Christmas” trees as “Holiday” trees, declaring that such political correctness (“PC”) is unworthy of a (mostly) Christian nation that indisputably owes its very 230+ -year-old existence to Jesus of Nazareth, a guy who's allegedly been dead for about 2000 years!
To be sure, Merriam-Webster’s “New International Dictionary, Unabridged” (2d Ed.—the "Holy Grail" of dictionaries) notes that the word “Christmas” is a derivative of the words “Christ” and “Mass,” presumably referring to the Communion sacrament celebrated on Christmas Day in the Roman Catholic Church and its earlier predecessors. So, OK, “Christmas” is a Christian event.
HOWEVER---
The organized Christian church was formed long after the said alleged death of Jesus, and it demanded unquestioned literal belief in hearsay writings by those who never knew him. The “New Testament” was so decreed by the Synod of Hippo in 383 CE, which gathering also dispensed with those clearly unreliable Gnostic Gospels and other "inconvenient" writings about early Christianity that just might not fit the authoritarian precepts of the early Roman church. The Gospel According To Luke contains one of the most beautiful pieces of literature known to any of us with its well-remembered story of the birth of Jesus as set forth in the King James Version, the one I learned as a child.
Nevertheless, as learned astronomers and others have pointed out, the shepherds would not likely have been out in the fields tending their flocks at night in late December! No, if the events described in the Gospel of Luke are correct, then the supposed birth of Jesus would have likely occurred in the spring along with the births of many other animals. The naked baby Jesus might have gotten very cold in that feed trough in the manger if he had been born in December, swaddling-cloths or not.
Early Christians in Europe had observed local pagans having a very good time in December celebrating the completion of the harvest and the turn of the sun to longer days following the Winter Solstice. People all over the Northern Hemisphere had been celebrating these occurrences for thousands of years, probably, and the early Christian hierarchy realized that, in order to subject these pagans to Christian control, they had to hijack the pagan festivals, the Winter Solstice, or Yule Festival, first and foremost.
So, those early Christians merely “adjusted” their calendar a bit and made the Winter Solstice Festival happily coincide with a new legend about the birth of Jesus. The bit about the shepherds in the field didn’t really matter since everybody in Europe figured it was warmer down south in “Asia Minor.”
The practice of decorating a cut evergreen tree was a pagan custom at one time but it, too, was hijacked by the Christian power structure to become a symbol of the church. As the influence and political power of The Church grew in Europe over time, it eagerly embraced the intolerance that is a fundamental part of the human condition and which so many others have come to suffer. Pagan celebrations were outlawed, and witches and other infidels were tortured and burned and otherwise killed off lest they “infect” the ignorant masses with their "untruths." Keeping the masses ignorant and credulous allowed The Church to maintain political control (and the cashflow). It may have been nearly impossible for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but the very wealthy church hierarchy were obviously already in, anyway.
Following World War II, the annual Christmas shopping spree took off with a vengeance. Families had much more disposable income and time off to go shopping. The advance of suburbia and shopping centers and malls accelerated the process, notwithstanding the once-powerful magic of downtown department stores and photos of expectant children on Santa's knee. Many could be reassured that they were doing the Lord’s work by ensuring that retailers and their employees would have a nice Christmas, too.
Having worked retail in several places in the past, I know from personal experience that many retailers lose money until the Christmas shopping season. Christmas shopping is absolutely essential to the health of the US economy. Don’t believe otherwise for a minute!
These days, some PC types try to be all-inclusive with due observances of the various winter festivals going on: Christmas, Kwanza’a, Chanukah, etc. What’s a well-meaning business to do but refer to its trees and decorations as “holiday” whatever? This seems to annoy the True Believers who will brook no variance: they intend to put the “Christ” back in Christmas with an in-your-face, jut-jawed declaration that such stuff is “CHRISTMAS” stuff, not “HOLIDAY” stuff! And anybody who doesn’t like it can kiss their you-know-what! Howwzat for the holidays? “Up yours” for Jesus! "Holiday," by the way, is a contraction of "holy day." It's just not as obvious to quasi-literate "good Christians."
Whatever the rest of us do, we’d better not stand in the way of those hyper-pious True Believers who intend to jam “Christmas” down our godless, pagan throats no matter what. It is not enough that they have been in almost total control of the US political and economic system, but any spineless government or retail PC schmuck who wants to practice a little tolerance had better get out of the way! It is “Christmas” or else, guys, and we are either with them or against them, as one of our Presidents has famously suggested.
Speaking of who said what, it is well to remember one of my favorite songs written by Kinky Friedman: “They Don’t Make Jews Like Jesus Anymore.”
Happy Holidays!
(The following was submitted to Richmond "Style Weekly" at least twice, but no reply was ever received from editor Scott Bass, who seems congenitally unable to respond as a normal, polite human being.)
Well, it is about that time of the year again. No, I don’t mean the raging guilt-trip that drives the Christmas-shopping bus! I am referring to the predictable whinging about the loss of the “true meaning of Christmas” that descends upon us less-than-thou each December harder than Brenda Lee’s recurrent, incessant bleating to go “Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree.”
The Saints Among Us just cannot restrain themselves from casting righteous blame upon us heathens for gleefully contributing to the loss of said “true meaning” with our incessant secularization of what is deemed almost exclusively a Christian holy event. In order to prove it, they rant in high dudgeon about the renaming of the “Christmas” trees as “Holiday” trees, declaring that such political correctness (“PC”) is unworthy of a (mostly) Christian nation that indisputably owes its very 230+ -year-old existence to Jesus of Nazareth, a guy who's allegedly been dead for about 2000 years!
To be sure, Merriam-Webster’s “New International Dictionary, Unabridged” (2d Ed.—the "Holy Grail" of dictionaries) notes that the word “Christmas” is a derivative of the words “Christ” and “Mass,” presumably referring to the Communion sacrament celebrated on Christmas Day in the Roman Catholic Church and its earlier predecessors. So, OK, “Christmas” is a Christian event.
HOWEVER---
The organized Christian church was formed long after the said alleged death of Jesus, and it demanded unquestioned literal belief in hearsay writings by those who never knew him. The “New Testament” was so decreed by the Synod of Hippo in 383 CE, which gathering also dispensed with those clearly unreliable Gnostic Gospels and other "inconvenient" writings about early Christianity that just might not fit the authoritarian precepts of the early Roman church. The Gospel According To Luke contains one of the most beautiful pieces of literature known to any of us with its well-remembered story of the birth of Jesus as set forth in the King James Version, the one I learned as a child.
Nevertheless, as learned astronomers and others have pointed out, the shepherds would not likely have been out in the fields tending their flocks at night in late December! No, if the events described in the Gospel of Luke are correct, then the supposed birth of Jesus would have likely occurred in the spring along with the births of many other animals. The naked baby Jesus might have gotten very cold in that feed trough in the manger if he had been born in December, swaddling-cloths or not.
Early Christians in Europe had observed local pagans having a very good time in December celebrating the completion of the harvest and the turn of the sun to longer days following the Winter Solstice. People all over the Northern Hemisphere had been celebrating these occurrences for thousands of years, probably, and the early Christian hierarchy realized that, in order to subject these pagans to Christian control, they had to hijack the pagan festivals, the Winter Solstice, or Yule Festival, first and foremost.
So, those early Christians merely “adjusted” their calendar a bit and made the Winter Solstice Festival happily coincide with a new legend about the birth of Jesus. The bit about the shepherds in the field didn’t really matter since everybody in Europe figured it was warmer down south in “Asia Minor.”
The practice of decorating a cut evergreen tree was a pagan custom at one time but it, too, was hijacked by the Christian power structure to become a symbol of the church. As the influence and political power of The Church grew in Europe over time, it eagerly embraced the intolerance that is a fundamental part of the human condition and which so many others have come to suffer. Pagan celebrations were outlawed, and witches and other infidels were tortured and burned and otherwise killed off lest they “infect” the ignorant masses with their "untruths." Keeping the masses ignorant and credulous allowed The Church to maintain political control (and the cashflow). It may have been nearly impossible for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but the very wealthy church hierarchy were obviously already in, anyway.
Following World War II, the annual Christmas shopping spree took off with a vengeance. Families had much more disposable income and time off to go shopping. The advance of suburbia and shopping centers and malls accelerated the process, notwithstanding the once-powerful magic of downtown department stores and photos of expectant children on Santa's knee. Many could be reassured that they were doing the Lord’s work by ensuring that retailers and their employees would have a nice Christmas, too.
Having worked retail in several places in the past, I know from personal experience that many retailers lose money until the Christmas shopping season. Christmas shopping is absolutely essential to the health of the US economy. Don’t believe otherwise for a minute!
These days, some PC types try to be all-inclusive with due observances of the various winter festivals going on: Christmas, Kwanza’a, Chanukah, etc. What’s a well-meaning business to do but refer to its trees and decorations as “holiday” whatever? This seems to annoy the True Believers who will brook no variance: they intend to put the “Christ” back in Christmas with an in-your-face, jut-jawed declaration that such stuff is “CHRISTMAS” stuff, not “HOLIDAY” stuff! And anybody who doesn’t like it can kiss their you-know-what! Howwzat for the holidays? “Up yours” for Jesus! "Holiday," by the way, is a contraction of "holy day." It's just not as obvious to quasi-literate "good Christians."
Whatever the rest of us do, we’d better not stand in the way of those hyper-pious True Believers who intend to jam “Christmas” down our godless, pagan throats no matter what. It is not enough that they have been in almost total control of the US political and economic system, but any spineless government or retail PC schmuck who wants to practice a little tolerance had better get out of the way! It is “Christmas” or else, guys, and we are either with them or against them, as one of our Presidents has famously suggested.
Speaking of who said what, it is well to remember one of my favorite songs written by Kinky Friedman: “They Don’t Make Jews Like Jesus Anymore.”
Happy Holidays!
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
BROKE DOWN: BAD TRIPS ON THUNDER ROAD AND ROUTE 66
© 11/23/10. All rights reserved.
I don’t know if we have “all been there,” but one of my friends has taken the same bad trip on “Thunder Road” that I did, and he lived to tell about it. It’s an experience that at least a few married men have had from time to time.
I am talking about, of course, the way in which nostalgia can dim the memories and create marital strife. I bought a video of “Thunder Road” which is, as I declared to my (now ex-) wife upon its receipt, the “greatest movie ever made.” That is what my memory as a twelve-year-old insisted, so I insisted that she sit down and watch this “greatest movie ever made,” complete with one of the “greatest theme songs ever sung.”
That theme song from “Thunder Road” had been an integral part of the lives of most of my male friends as we were growing up. The movie’s story (starring the late Robert Mitchum and his son) is about moonshiners driving fast cars on twisty roads, outrunning the “revenooers” in hot pursuit. What twelve-year-old boy is not gonna like THAT stuff?
Robert Mitchum was the epitomé of masculinity, and the fast cars hauling illicit ‘shine were to die for (which he finally did in the movie). There was really nothing else that mattered to me at the time, and most of my friends have confirmed similar experiences with the movie, BUT—
The movie sucks. I am ashamed and sad to admit that, but as my (ex-) wife and I were watching it, I sensed a growing tension between us as the movie’s action and plot pathetically failed to live up to my nostalgia-addled memories. I felt as if I had become the Biggest Dork in the Universe, having intensely recommended—no, INSISTED—that my woman sit down and watch that dreck with me so I could, once again, bask in the reflected masculinity of Robert Mitchum. At least she had the grace to laugh afterward. I say “afterward,” because she also had the grace to sit through the entire thing (or had the spite to make ME sit through the entire thing). It was AWFUL! I was mortified that I had made such a big deal out of such a pile of crap! And the song was pathetic. It was not nearly as majestic as I had remembered. It sounded as if it had been recorded in a soup can. I may as well have sat down and just eaten a huge pile of feces. Maybe my credibility was so shot with her that it became grounds for divorce!
And, that was not the end of it. Several months ago I was leafing through the video catalogs and came upon the “complete” DVD’s of Season One and Season Two of “Route 66,” which were made in 1960-61 and featured Martin Milner and George Maharis cruising around America in a gorgeous Corvette. It was EVERY teen guy’s dream to get a car like a Corvette and go riding with one’s best pal across America, looking for love and adventure. At the time there was no concern at all about how one would support oneself, much less put premium gas in that Corvette. It simply did not matter. It was way beyond “cool”!
So, I proceeded to order that set of DVD’s so I could revisit another one of my strongest memories, having not learned any lessons at all from my wretched trip down “Thunder Road.” Well, I got the DVD’s out just this past weekend and started watching in black-and-white splendor (like “Thunder Road”). The first episode on Disc One is taken up with the guys’ encounter with various ill-mannered rednecks in southern Louisiana (WAY off the course of Rte. 66!), working on an oil rig out in the Gulf that did NOT explode. Pretty lame. At least, if the oil rig had exploded, it would have been more credible than the contrived brusque encounters with the locals, all worked up and neatly resolved in just 30 minutes, as that was the length of each episode made for TV back then. And, we wonder why attention spans are so short today!
I managed to finish watching the fourth episode on Disc One last night, though I was nodding to sleep before 10:00 PM and have little memory of what it was about. This is just pathetic. I think there are four discs in each of two albums per each of the two seasons with four episodes thereon, which seems to total about 64 episodes. That is about 32 hours of black-and-white TV-watching, all told! With 30 hours left, I just don’t know that I want to burn that time that way. It’s not like I can get anything else done while watching, either (other than sleep).
I also have the complete “Upstairs, Downstairs” PBS series and the comedy series, “Keeping Up Appearances.” I also bought a wad of Victor Borge DVD’s. What in the world am I going to do? I used to think he was funny, but now I am worried, because those memories are also ancient. I can no longer trust my adolescent recollections. Victor Borge may have been a fine comedian as well as a good piano player, but should I trust myself?
I can’t even believe I am putting this down in writing and daring to let someone read it who has seen those movies recently and will surely conclude that I am an idiot, just for having paid good money to purchase the DVD’s and watched it again!
I am doomed.
I don’t know if we have “all been there,” but one of my friends has taken the same bad trip on “Thunder Road” that I did, and he lived to tell about it. It’s an experience that at least a few married men have had from time to time.
I am talking about, of course, the way in which nostalgia can dim the memories and create marital strife. I bought a video of “Thunder Road” which is, as I declared to my (now ex-) wife upon its receipt, the “greatest movie ever made.” That is what my memory as a twelve-year-old insisted, so I insisted that she sit down and watch this “greatest movie ever made,” complete with one of the “greatest theme songs ever sung.”
That theme song from “Thunder Road” had been an integral part of the lives of most of my male friends as we were growing up. The movie’s story (starring the late Robert Mitchum and his son) is about moonshiners driving fast cars on twisty roads, outrunning the “revenooers” in hot pursuit. What twelve-year-old boy is not gonna like THAT stuff?
Robert Mitchum was the epitomé of masculinity, and the fast cars hauling illicit ‘shine were to die for (which he finally did in the movie). There was really nothing else that mattered to me at the time, and most of my friends have confirmed similar experiences with the movie, BUT—
The movie sucks. I am ashamed and sad to admit that, but as my (ex-) wife and I were watching it, I sensed a growing tension between us as the movie’s action and plot pathetically failed to live up to my nostalgia-addled memories. I felt as if I had become the Biggest Dork in the Universe, having intensely recommended—no, INSISTED—that my woman sit down and watch that dreck with me so I could, once again, bask in the reflected masculinity of Robert Mitchum. At least she had the grace to laugh afterward. I say “afterward,” because she also had the grace to sit through the entire thing (or had the spite to make ME sit through the entire thing). It was AWFUL! I was mortified that I had made such a big deal out of such a pile of crap! And the song was pathetic. It was not nearly as majestic as I had remembered. It sounded as if it had been recorded in a soup can. I may as well have sat down and just eaten a huge pile of feces. Maybe my credibility was so shot with her that it became grounds for divorce!
And, that was not the end of it. Several months ago I was leafing through the video catalogs and came upon the “complete” DVD’s of Season One and Season Two of “Route 66,” which were made in 1960-61 and featured Martin Milner and George Maharis cruising around America in a gorgeous Corvette. It was EVERY teen guy’s dream to get a car like a Corvette and go riding with one’s best pal across America, looking for love and adventure. At the time there was no concern at all about how one would support oneself, much less put premium gas in that Corvette. It simply did not matter. It was way beyond “cool”!
So, I proceeded to order that set of DVD’s so I could revisit another one of my strongest memories, having not learned any lessons at all from my wretched trip down “Thunder Road.” Well, I got the DVD’s out just this past weekend and started watching in black-and-white splendor (like “Thunder Road”). The first episode on Disc One is taken up with the guys’ encounter with various ill-mannered rednecks in southern Louisiana (WAY off the course of Rte. 66!), working on an oil rig out in the Gulf that did NOT explode. Pretty lame. At least, if the oil rig had exploded, it would have been more credible than the contrived brusque encounters with the locals, all worked up and neatly resolved in just 30 minutes, as that was the length of each episode made for TV back then. And, we wonder why attention spans are so short today!
I managed to finish watching the fourth episode on Disc One last night, though I was nodding to sleep before 10:00 PM and have little memory of what it was about. This is just pathetic. I think there are four discs in each of two albums per each of the two seasons with four episodes thereon, which seems to total about 64 episodes. That is about 32 hours of black-and-white TV-watching, all told! With 30 hours left, I just don’t know that I want to burn that time that way. It’s not like I can get anything else done while watching, either (other than sleep).
I also have the complete “Upstairs, Downstairs” PBS series and the comedy series, “Keeping Up Appearances.” I also bought a wad of Victor Borge DVD’s. What in the world am I going to do? I used to think he was funny, but now I am worried, because those memories are also ancient. I can no longer trust my adolescent recollections. Victor Borge may have been a fine comedian as well as a good piano player, but should I trust myself?
I can’t even believe I am putting this down in writing and daring to let someone read it who has seen those movies recently and will surely conclude that I am an idiot, just for having paid good money to purchase the DVD’s and watched it again!
I am doomed.
Saturday, November 20, 2010
A "GUY THING"
© November 20, 2010. All rights reserved.
Most people, when they die, want to go to Heaven; I want to go to Harbor Freight! I love that place. I am as addicted to tools as junkies are to heroin. I buy stuff all the time just because I don’t already have it, whether I need it or not.
I was at Harbor Freight last night. It is several miles on the other side of Richmond from the direction from which I come. It requires a specific intent for me to go there. But, I am always pleasantly rewarded when I get there, even if I cannot find what I originally sought, like last night. Stuff just LEAPS into my shopping cart, which they so thoughtfully provide the customers. Like Costco or Sam’s Club, there is no way one can get out of Harbor Freight with just one or two items.
FOR EXAMPLE: last night I was seeking a wheeled cart on sale for my new sandblasting cabinet, which I also bought at Harbor Freight some months ago and which has yet to be used. I looked and looked for that cart to no avail, despite the determination that it was in stock. So, I got a rain-check. But, I also picked up a HUGE caliper about 30 inches long, some polishing rouge for plastic (I have some scratched reading glasses), some ceramic-bladed knives (they are REALLY sharp) and a set of four different tiny locking pliers, like Vise-Grips. I was ecstatic! It was almost better than orgasm, and a lot less work!
My shop is loaded with stuff I got at Harbor Freight that I have never used. I have all kinds of really neat devices that will ensure I can perform almost any repair task humanly possible. I never have the occasion—but I am prepared! I have several different sets of screwdrivers, sockets, stretchers, saws, saw blades, sanders, sanding devices, sandblasters, sandblasting equipment, compressors, cables, pullers, pliers, hammers, wrenches, probes, hoses, handles, fittings, fixtures, files, drill bits, measuring devices, whatever. I don’t care if I never use it—I will have it when I need it.
Willie Nelson celebrated his 75th birthday this week, and there was circulated on the Web a fine-looking photo of Willie and an apparent quote from him commemorating his longevity. He said that he had “outlived my pecker.” Well, that may eventually happen to most of us, but we will always have Harbor Freight, even if our prostate craps out on us!
It’s a “guy” thing; you wouldn’t understand!
Most people, when they die, want to go to Heaven; I want to go to Harbor Freight! I love that place. I am as addicted to tools as junkies are to heroin. I buy stuff all the time just because I don’t already have it, whether I need it or not.
I was at Harbor Freight last night. It is several miles on the other side of Richmond from the direction from which I come. It requires a specific intent for me to go there. But, I am always pleasantly rewarded when I get there, even if I cannot find what I originally sought, like last night. Stuff just LEAPS into my shopping cart, which they so thoughtfully provide the customers. Like Costco or Sam’s Club, there is no way one can get out of Harbor Freight with just one or two items.
FOR EXAMPLE: last night I was seeking a wheeled cart on sale for my new sandblasting cabinet, which I also bought at Harbor Freight some months ago and which has yet to be used. I looked and looked for that cart to no avail, despite the determination that it was in stock. So, I got a rain-check. But, I also picked up a HUGE caliper about 30 inches long, some polishing rouge for plastic (I have some scratched reading glasses), some ceramic-bladed knives (they are REALLY sharp) and a set of four different tiny locking pliers, like Vise-Grips. I was ecstatic! It was almost better than orgasm, and a lot less work!
My shop is loaded with stuff I got at Harbor Freight that I have never used. I have all kinds of really neat devices that will ensure I can perform almost any repair task humanly possible. I never have the occasion—but I am prepared! I have several different sets of screwdrivers, sockets, stretchers, saws, saw blades, sanders, sanding devices, sandblasters, sandblasting equipment, compressors, cables, pullers, pliers, hammers, wrenches, probes, hoses, handles, fittings, fixtures, files, drill bits, measuring devices, whatever. I don’t care if I never use it—I will have it when I need it.
Willie Nelson celebrated his 75th birthday this week, and there was circulated on the Web a fine-looking photo of Willie and an apparent quote from him commemorating his longevity. He said that he had “outlived my pecker.” Well, that may eventually happen to most of us, but we will always have Harbor Freight, even if our prostate craps out on us!
It’s a “guy” thing; you wouldn’t understand!
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Dems vs. Re-Pubes
(From an e-mail reply to a friend, inquiring about my (non-)involvement in the raising of the Va. interstate speed limits to 70 mph, and the absurd national DUI standard of 0.08% blood alcohol content, thanks to that "liberal" Bill Clinton.)
* * *
The Dems are often worse than the Re-Pubes, when it comes to correcting our ways!
The Re-Pubes want to criminalize all but the "Missionary Position" between hetero married couples, and the Dems want to make sure we don't sprain our private parts while doing "it" (because they heard somebody, somewhere suffered that misfortune) by requiring a govt.-approved "sex harness" for all such encounters! With training wheels! And warnings prominently printed on the device! And safety shields! And reflective side markers! And an audible back-up warning! The Re-Pubes want to bust us for having fun, and the Dems want to make sure it is no fun at all!
Spare me from both parties.
* * *
The Dems are often worse than the Re-Pubes, when it comes to correcting our ways!
The Re-Pubes want to criminalize all but the "Missionary Position" between hetero married couples, and the Dems want to make sure we don't sprain our private parts while doing "it" (because they heard somebody, somewhere suffered that misfortune) by requiring a govt.-approved "sex harness" for all such encounters! With training wheels! And warnings prominently printed on the device! And safety shields! And reflective side markers! And an audible back-up warning! The Re-Pubes want to bust us for having fun, and the Dems want to make sure it is no fun at all!
Spare me from both parties.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
MUD BOY AND THE NEUTRONS
MUD BOY AND THE NEUTRONS were playing on my car CD as I pulled into “Brothers” Italian restaurant at 8:20 PM Hallowe'en Night, one of the precious few establishments thankfully still open that late Sunday hour. I was ravenous, having not eaten since the day before and having worked outside all that day. The CD music source accompanied the book I am now reading, It Came From Memphis, a history of the post-WWII Memphis music scene.
I felt like a condemned prisoner, savoring the last meal before The Big Dirt Nap. The next day would be “clear liquids only” in preparation for the “cobra-cam” colonoscopy early the morning after in Charlottesville. I was eagerly anticipating consuming about a half-gallon of the dreaded “green-apple quick-step” cocktail that I should pick up at the drugstore and mix with cold water before guzzling. I figured disco-dancing was out for that night! Remaining close to the toilet was Priority No. One. (Or No. 2—this higher math confuses me so.)
All my reading glasses were accounted for, so there should have been no evidence that my head was ever lodged “where the sun don’t shine.” I had forgotten to ask the doc if the ‘scope was night-vision equipped. If ultra-violet, it would take tanning to a new level! Groucho Marx had observed that inside a dog, it was too dark to read, etc.
Pathetically stupid, not-at-all-frightening slasher flicks were on The Tube all day (I periodically checked), and I despaired of finding something amusing or interesting in my persistent channel-surfing at home. My porch lights were turned off to discourage the panhandling rug-rats who might show up and threaten to deprive me of all the candy I had purchased allegedly for the observance at hand. I loathe sharing anything. After all, I could have made my last meal exclusively of really small “Snickers” bars!
So, I started my “last meal” at “Brothers” (Oilville, Virginia) with a delicately breaded, fresh, fried calamari, complete with a small dish of marinara sauce and two huge wedges of lemon. It was some of the best I have ever eaten, as good as “Nick’s Roman Terrace” on West Broad Street (just east of Parham Road) in Richmond. Likewise, the Romaine lettuce in my Caesar salad was also very fresh, and cold. I finished up with a wonderfully crisp-toasted Italian sub sandwich, washed down with very cold Italian beer and cold water. It was a delightful meal, and I brought home a chocolate cannelone to munch on as I desperately tried to find something worthy on the TV. Regrettably, it was too late for some savory drip coffee to go with that pastry.
Much of getting old is about subjecting oneself to all sorts of invasive procedures that may only reveal one’s impending death. “Mud Boy and the Neutrons” don’t abate the experience. Had I known about these things as a child (like the dreaded annual prostate exam) I might have been less eager to reach adulthood, but we don’t know of nor learn about such things in our tender years, when “invasive devices” for most of us are otoscopes in our ears and hypodermic needles.
I once told my doc that if I felt both of his hands on my shoulders while undergoing the prostate exam, I was going to leave immediately! As bad as it is to endure such a procedure annually, it must be a living hell for the docs who have to perform them all year long! Dignity for both doctor and patient are redefined.
Well, chicken broth and no coffee all day before the exam. I hope I have lost a ton of weight for all the deprivation I have endured!
I felt like a condemned prisoner, savoring the last meal before The Big Dirt Nap. The next day would be “clear liquids only” in preparation for the “cobra-cam” colonoscopy early the morning after in Charlottesville. I was eagerly anticipating consuming about a half-gallon of the dreaded “green-apple quick-step” cocktail that I should pick up at the drugstore and mix with cold water before guzzling. I figured disco-dancing was out for that night! Remaining close to the toilet was Priority No. One. (Or No. 2—this higher math confuses me so.)
All my reading glasses were accounted for, so there should have been no evidence that my head was ever lodged “where the sun don’t shine.” I had forgotten to ask the doc if the ‘scope was night-vision equipped. If ultra-violet, it would take tanning to a new level! Groucho Marx had observed that inside a dog, it was too dark to read, etc.
Pathetically stupid, not-at-all-frightening slasher flicks were on The Tube all day (I periodically checked), and I despaired of finding something amusing or interesting in my persistent channel-surfing at home. My porch lights were turned off to discourage the panhandling rug-rats who might show up and threaten to deprive me of all the candy I had purchased allegedly for the observance at hand. I loathe sharing anything. After all, I could have made my last meal exclusively of really small “Snickers” bars!
So, I started my “last meal” at “Brothers” (Oilville, Virginia) with a delicately breaded, fresh, fried calamari, complete with a small dish of marinara sauce and two huge wedges of lemon. It was some of the best I have ever eaten, as good as “Nick’s Roman Terrace” on West Broad Street (just east of Parham Road) in Richmond. Likewise, the Romaine lettuce in my Caesar salad was also very fresh, and cold. I finished up with a wonderfully crisp-toasted Italian sub sandwich, washed down with very cold Italian beer and cold water. It was a delightful meal, and I brought home a chocolate cannelone to munch on as I desperately tried to find something worthy on the TV. Regrettably, it was too late for some savory drip coffee to go with that pastry.
Much of getting old is about subjecting oneself to all sorts of invasive procedures that may only reveal one’s impending death. “Mud Boy and the Neutrons” don’t abate the experience. Had I known about these things as a child (like the dreaded annual prostate exam) I might have been less eager to reach adulthood, but we don’t know of nor learn about such things in our tender years, when “invasive devices” for most of us are otoscopes in our ears and hypodermic needles.
I once told my doc that if I felt both of his hands on my shoulders while undergoing the prostate exam, I was going to leave immediately! As bad as it is to endure such a procedure annually, it must be a living hell for the docs who have to perform them all year long! Dignity for both doctor and patient are redefined.
Well, chicken broth and no coffee all day before the exam. I hope I have lost a ton of weight for all the deprivation I have endured!
Saturday, October 30, 2010
LAW vs. EQUITY IN VIRGINIA (updated)
(The following was published in Archives News, Vol. 20, No. 3, Fall, 2010, by the “Friends of the Virginia State Archives,” Richmond, Virginia. Since then, the differentiation between law and equity has been abolished in Va.)
One of the many unique qualities that are manifest in Virginia to this day is the distinction in Virginia circuit (general trial) courts between “law” and “equity,” a holdover from the English legal system. To this day, the Rules of the Supreme Court of Virginia have separate parts dedicated to law and equity procedures. In Virginia, law procedure usually allows recovery of money damages, while equity procedure allows specific relief, like injunctions.
Equity procedure in Virginia is derivative of that created around 1345 CE with the help of the early (Catholic) church in England, well before the establishment of the Anglican Church in 1534 CE. At the time, procedures in the “law” courts (controlled by the Crown) were archaic and convoluted. The only remedies usually available were the liquidation of all claims in those courts to money damages, and litigants were frequently and permanently thrown out for the most minor, technical errors in the initial papers pleading the case. Thus, there developed a strong need for some sort of “legal” relief that was unobtainable in the secular law courts.
The Lord Chancellor in England, therefore, set up a series of courts presided over by local “chancellors” to allow dissatisfied and frustrated litigants to move for relief they could not get in the law courts, like divorce and annulment of marriage, injunctions and, perhaps most importantly, specific performance of contractual obligations. However, a person could not come into the “chancery” courts unless and until he (or she?) had “clean hands,” meaning he could not get equity relief if he had also done wrong.
Obviously, the church already controlled most aspects of marriage and dissolution. Divorce procedure in Virginia is controlled by the equity rules to this day. Other types of equity (or chancery—the terms are interchangeable) relief in Virginia are the issuance of injunctions to compel or stop a particular behavior or action; restitution, to “restore” a legally injured or damaged person to the status he or she had before the injury or loss; and specific performance of contracts, especially contracts for the sale and/or purchase of real estate. As real estate is considered legally unique, it can be the subject of an equity procedure to compel its purchase or sale by a defaulting party. There may also be money damages available at law.
Today in Virginia, the circuit courts operate seamlessly as both law and equity courts. Unlike earlier times, law and equity relief can now be requested together in the same initiating papers (the pleadings), but they must be pleaded in separate “counts” (numbered paragraphs) within the pleadings. Different rules apply to stop law “actions” (statutes of limitation) and equity “causes” (doctrine of “laches”). Statutes of limitation are created by the legislature and are absolute, whereas the doctrine of laches is applied by the judges (who are sometimes still called “chancellors”) somewhat more flexibly. A standard of “fairness” is usually under consideration in such matters.
The initiating pleading in a law action is called a “Motion for Judgment,” while the initiating pleading in an equity cause is called a “Bill of Complaint.” The initiating parties are called “Plaintiffs” in law actions and “Complainants” in equity causes. The parties sued are called “Defendants” in law actions and “Respondents” in equity causes. These distinctions for the parties are not rigidly enforced.
It is the burden of the initiating party to know what kind of relief should be requested and to plead it correctly. There are still means of dismissal for incorrectly pleading a case, but it has gotten easier over time. I understand practically all other states (other than Virginia) have removed these lingering distinctions between law and equity.
One of the many unique qualities that are manifest in Virginia to this day is the distinction in Virginia circuit (general trial) courts between “law” and “equity,” a holdover from the English legal system. To this day, the Rules of the Supreme Court of Virginia have separate parts dedicated to law and equity procedures. In Virginia, law procedure usually allows recovery of money damages, while equity procedure allows specific relief, like injunctions.
Equity procedure in Virginia is derivative of that created around 1345 CE with the help of the early (Catholic) church in England, well before the establishment of the Anglican Church in 1534 CE. At the time, procedures in the “law” courts (controlled by the Crown) were archaic and convoluted. The only remedies usually available were the liquidation of all claims in those courts to money damages, and litigants were frequently and permanently thrown out for the most minor, technical errors in the initial papers pleading the case. Thus, there developed a strong need for some sort of “legal” relief that was unobtainable in the secular law courts.
The Lord Chancellor in England, therefore, set up a series of courts presided over by local “chancellors” to allow dissatisfied and frustrated litigants to move for relief they could not get in the law courts, like divorce and annulment of marriage, injunctions and, perhaps most importantly, specific performance of contractual obligations. However, a person could not come into the “chancery” courts unless and until he (or she?) had “clean hands,” meaning he could not get equity relief if he had also done wrong.
Obviously, the church already controlled most aspects of marriage and dissolution. Divorce procedure in Virginia is controlled by the equity rules to this day. Other types of equity (or chancery—the terms are interchangeable) relief in Virginia are the issuance of injunctions to compel or stop a particular behavior or action; restitution, to “restore” a legally injured or damaged person to the status he or she had before the injury or loss; and specific performance of contracts, especially contracts for the sale and/or purchase of real estate. As real estate is considered legally unique, it can be the subject of an equity procedure to compel its purchase or sale by a defaulting party. There may also be money damages available at law.
Today in Virginia, the circuit courts operate seamlessly as both law and equity courts. Unlike earlier times, law and equity relief can now be requested together in the same initiating papers (the pleadings), but they must be pleaded in separate “counts” (numbered paragraphs) within the pleadings. Different rules apply to stop law “actions” (statutes of limitation) and equity “causes” (doctrine of “laches”). Statutes of limitation are created by the legislature and are absolute, whereas the doctrine of laches is applied by the judges (who are sometimes still called “chancellors”) somewhat more flexibly. A standard of “fairness” is usually under consideration in such matters.
The initiating pleading in a law action is called a “Motion for Judgment,” while the initiating pleading in an equity cause is called a “Bill of Complaint.” The initiating parties are called “Plaintiffs” in law actions and “Complainants” in equity causes. The parties sued are called “Defendants” in law actions and “Respondents” in equity causes. These distinctions for the parties are not rigidly enforced.
It is the burden of the initiating party to know what kind of relief should be requested and to plead it correctly. There are still means of dismissal for incorrectly pleading a case, but it has gotten easier over time. I understand practically all other states (other than Virginia) have removed these lingering distinctions between law and equity.
Monday, October 4, 2010
WASHINGTON & LEE COUNTRY CLUB
Memoir (short) of my years at Washington & Lee University School of Law
This may be updated from time to time.
I—The Founding
I spent the 4-year period from 1969 through 1973 trying to matriculate through and graduate from the School of Law at Washington & Lee University, a very old, small school in Lexington, Virginia. George Washington had endowed "Liberty Hall Academy" with a substantial gift of Patowmack Co. stock, and the school was renamed "Washington College." Robert E. Lee became the President after the Civil War and lured over the law school being then independently operated in Lexington by John Randolph Tucker, Some time after Lee's death in 1870, Washington College was re-named Washington & Lee University (W&L).
II—Special (law) Ed
It took me a year longer than most to get out of W&L because I was having such a good time my first year I mostly forgot to study. Thankfully, the Dean and my professors did not give up on me, though they had ample provocation to do so. It took a long time, but I was grateful to have finally figured out that I needed to worry less about THE "right answer" and focus more on the "right question." That was what was totally different about the study of law. There was no need, actually, to worry about the "right answer." I also learned that the judge will always tell you what the "right answer" is!
III—Phi Delta Phi
I had previously attended Randolph-Macon College in Ashland, Virginia, graduating in 1968. For almost 3 years while at R-MC, I was desperately regretting never having joined a fraternity, but during my last year, it fell into perspective, and now I am truly grateful I did not subject myself nor submit to that nonsense. Nevertheless, during my 2d year at W&L, I wound up as the president of Phi Delta Phi, a legal "fraternity," and I was elected only because I knew how to organize a party! (Some things never change.) The Dean of the Law School was also a member, and he reproached me one day because we never sponsored any thoughtful or cultural or academic activities. I had to break it to him that my fellow student members would never stand for it! We were just a bunch of dissolute party animals!
IV—Lee Chapel
Lee Chapel sits in the lower front part of the campus opposite to and facing the Colonnade on top of the hill, and the Lee Family Crypt is in the basement wherein "Marse Robert" Lee and the rest of his family are entombed. On the main floor at the front of the chapel interior is the "famous" marble sculpture by Edward Valentine of Robert E. Lee seemingly on his deathbed, but instead only in recumbent pose sleeping on a campaign cot during some arduous military procedure. As a friend of mine has observed, when one enters Lee “Chapel,” it is not clear who or what one is supposed to worship!
For years, the skeleton of Robert E. Lee's horse, "Traveller," was on display in the basement of the Chapel, later to be interred (see below). Charlie McDowell, who grew up in Lexington and who recently died, was the long-time Washington correspondent for the Richmond (Va.) Times-Dispatch, and he had been at W&L in the late 1940's with such luminaries as Pat Robertson and Roger Mudd, among others. I heard him speak one day at a gathering of lawyers, and he regaled us with some tales of his student days. He told us of the time when some fellow students were guides at Lee Chapel, and they would lead the tourists past the Valentine statue down the stairs to the Family Crypt and the display of Traveller's skeleton. One of the students was a Biology major, and he proceeded to fetch a skeleton of a small foal from the biology lab and set it up next to Traveller's skeleton. Then as the tourists were paraded past, they would be told that the larger skeleton was, of course, Traveller, and the small one was Traveller as a young foal! No one missed a beat!
V—The solemn burial of Traveller
During my last year at W&L, I was walking across campus one mild spring day in my typical attire of shorts, T-shirt, pathetic scraggly beard, long-ish hair and sandals, and I saw a cluster of folks fully dressed in dark, somber colors gathered by the side of Lee Chapel (see above).
I approached the edge of the crowd and, pacing back and forth, craned my neck to get a better view of what was going on. Some therein glared back at me for my insufficiently mournful attire (and attitude). What I saw was the priest from the Episcopal church on the campus corner in full vestments conducting the Episcopal Service for the Dead over the freshly interred bones of Traveller, which had been buried in a hole by the side of Lee Chapel and over which there had been placed an engraved granite slab reciting the pertinent data. Said mourners were gathered round respectfully. As I said, Traveller's skeleton had been on display in the basement of Lee Chapel for several years but it had finally gotten too moldy or brittle to remain so.
The thing that struck me most profoundly is that I had no idea Traveller was an Episcopalian!
VI—Zollman's Pavilion
In 2003, on the occasion of our class's 30th Reunion, we were trundled out to "Zollman's Pavilion" for a picnic lunch, the Pavilion being nothing more than a rough, corrugated tin shed with concrete floor sitting on the banks of Buffalo Creek, about 6 miles south of Lexington. It seems that W&L had engaged the Pavilion at which to host wistful alumni events.
Now, the true history of Zollman's Pavilion is that it had been the site of some of the wildest, most Bacchanalian parties ever held under the auspices of students at W&L or the adjacent military college, Virginia Military Institute, complete with live music and plastic garbage cans full of "Purple Jesus" (a homemade concoction of grape Hi-C, other fruit juices, oranges, lemons, limes, cherries AND grain alcohol) with a substantially intoxicated group of attendees present. My dim recollections are that it almost ALWAYS rained whenever there was an event at Zollman's, and there were always several cars stuck either in the mud at Zollman's or in the ditches along the road leading down to Zollman's. So, the prevailing ethic was to help remove said vehicles from said ditches before the gendarmes arrived to create more problems for the inebriated students who had driven into said ditches. (My, how times have changed!)
Well, at our 30th Reunion at Zollman's, held on a most inapt sunny afternoon, a period of time passed to allow our box-lunches to digest and our alcohol-dimmed memories to revive and squeeze us in their nostalgic bear-hug. Some "suit" working for W&L rather clumsily attempted to put the "touch" on us alums for donations of money, figuring that we would be unable to resist such a warm, fuzzy, nostalgia-addled pitch. I was rather annoyed by this blatant attempt to work me over, so I got up and promptly left. I should have known things were somehow not right when I had failed to see any cars in ditches while driving down to Zollman's that day!
VII—Cheap eats and hibachis
One of the most memorable things about my days at W&L were how inexpensive things were back then. Gasoline sold for less than 35c per gallon! One could purchase ground beef for 59c a pound or less! One could purchase a WHOLE CASE of (rotgut) beer for under $5, not just a six-pack! And, we consumed Gallo "Hearty Burgundy" by the half-gallon which also was pretty cheap back then, under $5 as I recall.
We could buy and grill huge slabs of beef on hibachis and wind up feeding four of us for less than $5 a meal. I never see hibachis anymore. A hibachi was a small cast-iron charcoal brazier with two (usually) wood-handled grills about 10" x 10" each, clamped onto the back of the hibachi and cantilevered over the coals. Most of us had them because they were small enough to move into our small apartments after the fire had gone out. Our student-apartment rent was $55 per month, INCLUSIVE of all utilities! We had it made. Law-school tuition was less than $1200 a semester. Recent graduates who got really good starting salaries would brag about getting $10,000 a year! As a sole practitioner (I was self-employed my entire professional career), I earned $5200 my first year--$100 a week!
We never had it so good.
VIII—"The Peoples' Food Restaurant"
In the early 1970's there was a social mood extant that was quite different from the usual rigid coat-&-tie demeanor of times then past at W&L (now desperately in revival). Admittedly, W&L was not a hotbed of radical activity as were some other campuses at the time, but there was plenty of dope to smoke and lots of apparent hippies about. Clean-shaven faces and preppy attire had given substantial way to leather, sandals, tie-dye, long hair and beards. The founding chapter of the venerable "Old South" fraternity, Kappa Alpha, had reputedly lost its charter for awhile allegedly because some rather annoyed alumni had stopped by after a football game, expecting to sing some frat songs around the piano and had discovered instead large posters of Jimi Hendrix, "Che" Guevara and Janis Joplin illuminated by ultraviolet blacklights glowing through a pervasive fog of cannabis.
I had lost (or found?) my own way during those days. I became fond of John Waters's nasty movies like the then-recently-screened Pink Flamingos," and I had developed a liking for the warped humor of the "Firesign Theatre" available only on vinyl records, best enjoyed with a lot of dope. CD's and iPods were a long ways off. We did not even have cassette tapes yet, but I had a LearJet 8-track in my car!
"Head" shops were openly trading their wares back then, including cigarette rolling papers and machines, fancy bongs and pipes, posters and provocative bumper stickers, peace-sign jewelry, leather bags and other goods frequently associated with the smoking of marijuana. I never saw anything associated with the use of cocaine or any other drug at the time.
A group of "hippies" had taken over the run-down "White Column Inn" on Main Street in Lexington and opened "The Peoples' Food Restaurant," offering whole-grain homemade breads, sprouts and so forth. Their signature sandwich was the "Peoples' Special," a fried-egg-and-melted-cheese concoction with sliced raw onion and alfalfa sprouts on homemade-mayo-slathered homemade gritty whole-wheat bread. It was absolutely wonderful! I consumed several of them and have also made my own since, washed down liberally with good beer (not the rotgut we used to buy for less than $5 a case!)
IX—"Rockbridge Red"
It might be considered disingenuous if I did not mention one of the most pervasive influences in my life during my time in Lexington, and that was the massive “lids” of marijuana (“dope”) that had been apparently grown locally and was sold only to students by one of my fellow law students during my time there.
The product was a beautiful home-grown material that was reddish-gold in color, thus its name, “Rockbridge Red.” One could buy a massive handful in a plastic baggie for $15! That is an amazingly low price, and today’s costs are mind-boggling because my market sense was set in those times and under those circumstances. I have not purchased any marijuana in about 30 years, and I don’t really smoke it much anymore. Neither do most of the scores of people who once did. (So much for its allegedly addictive qualities, per the DEA.) But my memories are fond ones.
AND, “Rockbridge Red” would get one really stoned. It wasn’t lethal, but it was a “magic carpet ride”! The purveyor must have grown a huge amount of it, because it was available for a very long time. He would come to school and always seemed to have plenty of “lids” in his bookbag. He was also a very good student and later became a prosecutor after graduation. I shall avoid any further identifying information so that he shall remain protected, wherever he may be. I have not seen him in years.
As I indicated, I knew a lot of people who were smoking “Rockbridge Red” back then, folks who became prominent doctors, teachers, preachers, lawyers and judges and who probably don’t smoke dope today and haven’t in years. But it was the thing to do back then for a lot of us, and it made life very interesting. For me, I know for a fact it made me smarter, because it opened up channels in my mind that I did not know were there before. I came to look at things much differently thereafter, much more expansively and ecumenically, and I am grateful for that enlightenment. The skeptics can kiss my ass.
I am sure there were some who overdid and “overdosed,” but they must have been few and far between. I have never witnessed a drug any more innocuous than marijuana, whereas cocaine and legal alcohol are extremely dangerous. The only thing that criminalization of marijuana does is ruin lives—it cannot and does not discourage any of us who want to smoke dope. All it does is send some peaceful offenders to confinement, after-the-fact, for engaging in something (possession of dope) that harms ABSOLUTELY no one else. Those who don’t want to smoke it are obviously not deterred by the law but by their own preferences. If there were a MEDICAL issue regarding the consumption of dope, then why is it treated as a criminal act instead of as a medical problem? And, why are all the competent studies and examinations contrary to those politically-driven conclusions?
Marijuana was outlawed in the 1930’s for two main reasons: alcohol had been legalized again, so otherwise-unemployed still-busters had a job in the Depression. Secondly, marijuana was often used by black musicians back then, so there was a suggestion that it would make white kids act and think like “Nigras.” Fast-forward to the 1970’s, and hippies and other “inappropriate” people are enjoying marijuana and mocking Richard Nixon, thus fueling the hostilities of most law-enforcement officers, prosecutors, etc., most of whom still viscerally hate hippies, love politicians who are “tough on crime,” and who lobby hard for intensifying the criminal consequences of associating with dope. Thus, the absurd “War On Drugs” was born and lives to this day, now enforced by President Barack Obama, like his predecessor Bill Clinton, a former dope smoker. A lot of vile energy and bad karma have been expended on enforcement of the laws criminalizing marijuana.
But, a lot of us (now in our sixties) have smoked it anyway, and fortunately we were never caught. Too many hapless folks were caught, however, and their lives were ruined. TO THIS DAY, easily 40 years later, one can still get more time in prison for selling dope than for killing one’s wife or boss.
No, my law grades were not the highest by a long shot. Many exemplary law students did not smoke dope. Many of them were and are raving dorks. But most of my friends and I did smoke dope, and we are not dummies, either.
This may be updated from time to time.
I—The Founding
I spent the 4-year period from 1969 through 1973 trying to matriculate through and graduate from the School of Law at Washington & Lee University, a very old, small school in Lexington, Virginia. George Washington had endowed "Liberty Hall Academy" with a substantial gift of Patowmack Co. stock, and the school was renamed "Washington College." Robert E. Lee became the President after the Civil War and lured over the law school being then independently operated in Lexington by John Randolph Tucker, Some time after Lee's death in 1870, Washington College was re-named Washington & Lee University (W&L).
II—Special (law) Ed
It took me a year longer than most to get out of W&L because I was having such a good time my first year I mostly forgot to study. Thankfully, the Dean and my professors did not give up on me, though they had ample provocation to do so. It took a long time, but I was grateful to have finally figured out that I needed to worry less about THE "right answer" and focus more on the "right question." That was what was totally different about the study of law. There was no need, actually, to worry about the "right answer." I also learned that the judge will always tell you what the "right answer" is!
III—Phi Delta Phi
I had previously attended Randolph-Macon College in Ashland, Virginia, graduating in 1968. For almost 3 years while at R-MC, I was desperately regretting never having joined a fraternity, but during my last year, it fell into perspective, and now I am truly grateful I did not subject myself nor submit to that nonsense. Nevertheless, during my 2d year at W&L, I wound up as the president of Phi Delta Phi, a legal "fraternity," and I was elected only because I knew how to organize a party! (Some things never change.) The Dean of the Law School was also a member, and he reproached me one day because we never sponsored any thoughtful or cultural or academic activities. I had to break it to him that my fellow student members would never stand for it! We were just a bunch of dissolute party animals!
IV—Lee Chapel
Lee Chapel sits in the lower front part of the campus opposite to and facing the Colonnade on top of the hill, and the Lee Family Crypt is in the basement wherein "Marse Robert" Lee and the rest of his family are entombed. On the main floor at the front of the chapel interior is the "famous" marble sculpture by Edward Valentine of Robert E. Lee seemingly on his deathbed, but instead only in recumbent pose sleeping on a campaign cot during some arduous military procedure. As a friend of mine has observed, when one enters Lee “Chapel,” it is not clear who or what one is supposed to worship!
For years, the skeleton of Robert E. Lee's horse, "Traveller," was on display in the basement of the Chapel, later to be interred (see below). Charlie McDowell, who grew up in Lexington and who recently died, was the long-time Washington correspondent for the Richmond (Va.) Times-Dispatch, and he had been at W&L in the late 1940's with such luminaries as Pat Robertson and Roger Mudd, among others. I heard him speak one day at a gathering of lawyers, and he regaled us with some tales of his student days. He told us of the time when some fellow students were guides at Lee Chapel, and they would lead the tourists past the Valentine statue down the stairs to the Family Crypt and the display of Traveller's skeleton. One of the students was a Biology major, and he proceeded to fetch a skeleton of a small foal from the biology lab and set it up next to Traveller's skeleton. Then as the tourists were paraded past, they would be told that the larger skeleton was, of course, Traveller, and the small one was Traveller as a young foal! No one missed a beat!
V—The solemn burial of Traveller
During my last year at W&L, I was walking across campus one mild spring day in my typical attire of shorts, T-shirt, pathetic scraggly beard, long-ish hair and sandals, and I saw a cluster of folks fully dressed in dark, somber colors gathered by the side of Lee Chapel (see above).
I approached the edge of the crowd and, pacing back and forth, craned my neck to get a better view of what was going on. Some therein glared back at me for my insufficiently mournful attire (and attitude). What I saw was the priest from the Episcopal church on the campus corner in full vestments conducting the Episcopal Service for the Dead over the freshly interred bones of Traveller, which had been buried in a hole by the side of Lee Chapel and over which there had been placed an engraved granite slab reciting the pertinent data. Said mourners were gathered round respectfully. As I said, Traveller's skeleton had been on display in the basement of Lee Chapel for several years but it had finally gotten too moldy or brittle to remain so.
The thing that struck me most profoundly is that I had no idea Traveller was an Episcopalian!
VI—Zollman's Pavilion
In 2003, on the occasion of our class's 30th Reunion, we were trundled out to "Zollman's Pavilion" for a picnic lunch, the Pavilion being nothing more than a rough, corrugated tin shed with concrete floor sitting on the banks of Buffalo Creek, about 6 miles south of Lexington. It seems that W&L had engaged the Pavilion at which to host wistful alumni events.
Now, the true history of Zollman's Pavilion is that it had been the site of some of the wildest, most Bacchanalian parties ever held under the auspices of students at W&L or the adjacent military college, Virginia Military Institute, complete with live music and plastic garbage cans full of "Purple Jesus" (a homemade concoction of grape Hi-C, other fruit juices, oranges, lemons, limes, cherries AND grain alcohol) with a substantially intoxicated group of attendees present. My dim recollections are that it almost ALWAYS rained whenever there was an event at Zollman's, and there were always several cars stuck either in the mud at Zollman's or in the ditches along the road leading down to Zollman's. So, the prevailing ethic was to help remove said vehicles from said ditches before the gendarmes arrived to create more problems for the inebriated students who had driven into said ditches. (My, how times have changed!)
Well, at our 30th Reunion at Zollman's, held on a most inapt sunny afternoon, a period of time passed to allow our box-lunches to digest and our alcohol-dimmed memories to revive and squeeze us in their nostalgic bear-hug. Some "suit" working for W&L rather clumsily attempted to put the "touch" on us alums for donations of money, figuring that we would be unable to resist such a warm, fuzzy, nostalgia-addled pitch. I was rather annoyed by this blatant attempt to work me over, so I got up and promptly left. I should have known things were somehow not right when I had failed to see any cars in ditches while driving down to Zollman's that day!
VII—Cheap eats and hibachis
One of the most memorable things about my days at W&L were how inexpensive things were back then. Gasoline sold for less than 35c per gallon! One could purchase ground beef for 59c a pound or less! One could purchase a WHOLE CASE of (rotgut) beer for under $5, not just a six-pack! And, we consumed Gallo "Hearty Burgundy" by the half-gallon which also was pretty cheap back then, under $5 as I recall.
We could buy and grill huge slabs of beef on hibachis and wind up feeding four of us for less than $5 a meal. I never see hibachis anymore. A hibachi was a small cast-iron charcoal brazier with two (usually) wood-handled grills about 10" x 10" each, clamped onto the back of the hibachi and cantilevered over the coals. Most of us had them because they were small enough to move into our small apartments after the fire had gone out. Our student-apartment rent was $55 per month, INCLUSIVE of all utilities! We had it made. Law-school tuition was less than $1200 a semester. Recent graduates who got really good starting salaries would brag about getting $10,000 a year! As a sole practitioner (I was self-employed my entire professional career), I earned $5200 my first year--$100 a week!
We never had it so good.
VIII—"The Peoples' Food Restaurant"
In the early 1970's there was a social mood extant that was quite different from the usual rigid coat-&-tie demeanor of times then past at W&L (now desperately in revival). Admittedly, W&L was not a hotbed of radical activity as were some other campuses at the time, but there was plenty of dope to smoke and lots of apparent hippies about. Clean-shaven faces and preppy attire had given substantial way to leather, sandals, tie-dye, long hair and beards. The founding chapter of the venerable "Old South" fraternity, Kappa Alpha, had reputedly lost its charter for awhile allegedly because some rather annoyed alumni had stopped by after a football game, expecting to sing some frat songs around the piano and had discovered instead large posters of Jimi Hendrix, "Che" Guevara and Janis Joplin illuminated by ultraviolet blacklights glowing through a pervasive fog of cannabis.
I had lost (or found?) my own way during those days. I became fond of John Waters's nasty movies like the then-recently-screened Pink Flamingos," and I had developed a liking for the warped humor of the "Firesign Theatre" available only on vinyl records, best enjoyed with a lot of dope. CD's and iPods were a long ways off. We did not even have cassette tapes yet, but I had a LearJet 8-track in my car!
"Head" shops were openly trading their wares back then, including cigarette rolling papers and machines, fancy bongs and pipes, posters and provocative bumper stickers, peace-sign jewelry, leather bags and other goods frequently associated with the smoking of marijuana. I never saw anything associated with the use of cocaine or any other drug at the time.
A group of "hippies" had taken over the run-down "White Column Inn" on Main Street in Lexington and opened "The Peoples' Food Restaurant," offering whole-grain homemade breads, sprouts and so forth. Their signature sandwich was the "Peoples' Special," a fried-egg-and-melted-cheese concoction with sliced raw onion and alfalfa sprouts on homemade-mayo-slathered homemade gritty whole-wheat bread. It was absolutely wonderful! I consumed several of them and have also made my own since, washed down liberally with good beer (not the rotgut we used to buy for less than $5 a case!)
IX—"Rockbridge Red"
It might be considered disingenuous if I did not mention one of the most pervasive influences in my life during my time in Lexington, and that was the massive “lids” of marijuana (“dope”) that had been apparently grown locally and was sold only to students by one of my fellow law students during my time there.
The product was a beautiful home-grown material that was reddish-gold in color, thus its name, “Rockbridge Red.” One could buy a massive handful in a plastic baggie for $15! That is an amazingly low price, and today’s costs are mind-boggling because my market sense was set in those times and under those circumstances. I have not purchased any marijuana in about 30 years, and I don’t really smoke it much anymore. Neither do most of the scores of people who once did. (So much for its allegedly addictive qualities, per the DEA.) But my memories are fond ones.
AND, “Rockbridge Red” would get one really stoned. It wasn’t lethal, but it was a “magic carpet ride”! The purveyor must have grown a huge amount of it, because it was available for a very long time. He would come to school and always seemed to have plenty of “lids” in his bookbag. He was also a very good student and later became a prosecutor after graduation. I shall avoid any further identifying information so that he shall remain protected, wherever he may be. I have not seen him in years.
As I indicated, I knew a lot of people who were smoking “Rockbridge Red” back then, folks who became prominent doctors, teachers, preachers, lawyers and judges and who probably don’t smoke dope today and haven’t in years. But it was the thing to do back then for a lot of us, and it made life very interesting. For me, I know for a fact it made me smarter, because it opened up channels in my mind that I did not know were there before. I came to look at things much differently thereafter, much more expansively and ecumenically, and I am grateful for that enlightenment. The skeptics can kiss my ass.
I am sure there were some who overdid and “overdosed,” but they must have been few and far between. I have never witnessed a drug any more innocuous than marijuana, whereas cocaine and legal alcohol are extremely dangerous. The only thing that criminalization of marijuana does is ruin lives—it cannot and does not discourage any of us who want to smoke dope. All it does is send some peaceful offenders to confinement, after-the-fact, for engaging in something (possession of dope) that harms ABSOLUTELY no one else. Those who don’t want to smoke it are obviously not deterred by the law but by their own preferences. If there were a MEDICAL issue regarding the consumption of dope, then why is it treated as a criminal act instead of as a medical problem? And, why are all the competent studies and examinations contrary to those politically-driven conclusions?
Marijuana was outlawed in the 1930’s for two main reasons: alcohol had been legalized again, so otherwise-unemployed still-busters had a job in the Depression. Secondly, marijuana was often used by black musicians back then, so there was a suggestion that it would make white kids act and think like “Nigras.” Fast-forward to the 1970’s, and hippies and other “inappropriate” people are enjoying marijuana and mocking Richard Nixon, thus fueling the hostilities of most law-enforcement officers, prosecutors, etc., most of whom still viscerally hate hippies, love politicians who are “tough on crime,” and who lobby hard for intensifying the criminal consequences of associating with dope. Thus, the absurd “War On Drugs” was born and lives to this day, now enforced by President Barack Obama, like his predecessor Bill Clinton, a former dope smoker. A lot of vile energy and bad karma have been expended on enforcement of the laws criminalizing marijuana.
But, a lot of us (now in our sixties) have smoked it anyway, and fortunately we were never caught. Too many hapless folks were caught, however, and their lives were ruined. TO THIS DAY, easily 40 years later, one can still get more time in prison for selling dope than for killing one’s wife or boss.
No, my law grades were not the highest by a long shot. Many exemplary law students did not smoke dope. Many of them were and are raving dorks. But most of my friends and I did smoke dope, and we are not dummies, either.
X—(In)security (2019)
One of the most memorable alumni experiences I’ve had since graduating is comparing the ubiquitous uniformed security now at W&L with the casual “windbreaker” security of the sole “enforcer” of my time on campus. “Murph” was the only “security” officer on the entire campus back then, a nice, even-tempered, unarmed guy who walked around campus in his windbreaker, carrying a flashlight and handing out parking tickets to those of us who wantonly made things difficult for others by leaving our cars in absurd places. I knew “Murph” (as we all did), and he was always so very pleasant.
Fast forward to our 10th Reunion in 1983, and our class is gathering in the blazingly-lit gym that Friday night with all the other folks for a communal gab-fest and light meal. Imagine my shock and disappointment to walk in and see a bunch of stern-faced, bullet-headed, private-force gendarmerie in light-blue shirts with badges and heavy utility belts with truncheons and other multiple devices thereon, standing at "parade rest" all around some sort of mezzanine, staring down at us lawless peons on the gym floor below with nary a smile cracking anyone’s face! They stared at us the whole time we were reuniting and “conviviating”! It was most unsettling and yet another reminder that we were not in Kansas anymore! Perhaps they were worried we were all gonna break down and “moon” them at the same time, or something!
Ever since, I have had the growing suspicion that I simply do not belong at W&L anymore. It has been “gentrifying” with a vengeance! Way too prissy for me! My reunion every 5 years or so has been less and less a gathering of friends and more and more a fundraising opportunity for the “development office” that finally snatched the organization of reunions away from the “alumni office.” It had gotten so unpleasant I did not attend my 45th Reunion last year, and I seriously doubt if I will bother to attend my 50th Reunion in 2023.
Perhaps I am just weary of hearing and telling the same stories over and over again!
XI—Freddie Goodhart (added in 2024)
What can I possibly say about Freddie Goodhart?
He died just about six years ago. Hard to believe it’s been so long. He was such an important part of my life, yet my brain is obviously fading. That’s what “old age” will do. Fade everything.
Freddie was 88 when he died—he looked 58. He always looked much younger than his years, and he would do just about anything not deadly, so it was easy to treat him as a contemporary.
Frederick Phillips McCormick-Goodhart. That was his real name. But he was anything but a patrician. Freddie had dual British/American citizenships. His father was a British diplomat who introduced him to Winston Churchill during the Second World War on the HMS Dreadnought out in the Chesapeake Bay, when Freddie was only 15 or so. It was the only time that Churchill, then the Prime Minister of Great Britain, visited the US during World War II. I think Freddie’s mother was a native of Baltimore. Freddie’s father was descended in a collateral line from Cyrus McCormick, who invented the reaper and hailed from Raphine, Virginia, just a few miles north of Lexington.
But Freddie was a car freak and a “killer” banjo player. He’d owned a junkyard and knew cars backwards and forwards. I still have a 1941 Buick convertible Freddie bought from the original owner, who lived out near Warm Springs and commuted in that Buick to and from the Pentagon every week during World War II, up and down US Route 220.
Half of damned-near everything I own I bought from Freddie who, when I met him in the Fall of 1969 in my first year of law school, was running a “second-hand shop” on Jefferson Street in Lexington. I was immediately attracted to him, like a moth to flame. In the spring of 1970, I bought that 1941 Buick for $250 from a professor to whom the car had been sold. It was broke down in Freddie’s front yard. The top had rotted off and a plywood board was balanced on the top frame, held in place by a spare tire. Thanks to a great mechanic at the local Chevrolet dealer, I finally got that car running and drove it, sans top, all that following winter while my wife-to-be drove my “good” car. At least it had a roof and windows and a heater.
What we WILL do for love! My pith helmet came in handy! I stayed pretty dry that winter and was not sick for a single day!
Freddie was a “Buick” man. He knew Buick “Straight-Eight” engines better than anyone. He convinced me I should buy that broke-down 1941 convertible, even though he had a running 1937 Buick sedan he would have sold me. He liked to put an old-timey metal soda-acid fire extinguisher canister on the Buick exhaust pipe in place of the muffler. It made a really nice, throaty rumble. Freddie had a beautiful 1937 black Buick convertible with stick shift, running boards, a rumble seat and fender skirts. He had a “Remember Pearl Harbor” emblem bolted to the top of the license plate. He also had a late 1920’s air-cooled “Franklin” sedan that was prominently featured at his wedding.
EVERYBODY has stories about Freddie. Stories about Freddie are what exhaust fumes are to Diesel trucks! Ubiquitous. Freddie and I would travel around and play music together on occasion. I was originally a saxophone player, but I later took up the blues harmonica. Freddie could play ANYTHING on the banjo and did. But bluegrass music was his primary interest, and he was well-known for his craft in music circles. He could play “Foggy Mountain Breakdown” as good as Earl Scruggs.
I have a small collection of “Lucky Strike” tobacco memorabilia. Freddie had an UNOPENED pack of “Lucky Strike Green” cigarettes in his store, and I wanted it. Freddie agreed to swap me his pack of Luckies for an unopened pack of “Piedmont” cigarettes that I had. Even. So we swapped, and I still have the Luckies. A few months later, I asked him if he still had the Piedmonts because I wanted to buy them back. He did not have them, so I asked what he got for them. He sheepishly admitted he got nothing for them because he was having a nicotine fit one day at the shop, tore open the pack and smoked ALL of the Piedmonts! I was stunned. HOW could he do such a thing? But, that was just Freddie being Freddie. There was NOTHING that Freddie had that was not for sale, so long as his price was met. His long-suffering wife was resigned to all that. Freddie sometimes even sold HER stuff, if he could do a “deal”!
I stay in touch with Freddie’s widow and his oldest daughter, married for years to a Lexington architect. He had seven children with his late first wife (whom I did not know) and two more with his second wife. They are all very nice people. I attended Freddie’s second wedding in the summer of 1970 while working near my wife-to-be up in NY State, near Rochester. I came down to Lexington for the wedding and am proud to have been there. All of them are among my closest friends, though we don’t see much of each other anymore.
In my last year of law school, “Jim Beam” distillery released a commemorative ceramic flask for their bourbon whiskey, a handsome big red cardinal sitting on a dogwood branch. Freddie was convinced that flask was going to be a “collector’s item.” I was in Freddie’s shop one day, and he handed me a wad of cash and told me to go up to the ABC store about a half-block away and buy him a dozen of the “Jim Beam” flasks. I bought two of them for myself, and delivered the bottles and the change to Freddie. Well, we failed to predict that “Jim Beam” would release THOUSANDS of those flasks, so there was never any “collectible” value to them, whatsoever! I think Freddie eventually sold most of those whiskey bottles. We drank all the whiskey.
Freddie Goodhart was, indeed, a very important part of most of my life. I met many fine people who were friends of Freddie. He seemed to have friends all over the world. I spent many hours in his shop, a wonderful place to waste valuable time. I spent many days and nights in his home or on Martha’s Vineyard, enjoying the company of Freddie, his wife and his kids. Many of my law-school mates rented rooms at his farm. I met my first wife-to-be in his living room at one of the many parties there. I took some great road trips with Freddie, up and down the East Coast, playing music, scanning shop inventories along the way, “swapping lies,” discussing “cars,” dropping in on friends, and doing a lot of laughing.
I shall dearly miss him the rest of my days.
FOOL'S GOLD
(c) 2010 Soowee
All rights reserved.
Barack Obama's Administration and the Chair of the Federal Reserve continue to pursue the sort of "supply-side"/"free-market capitalism" nonsense that has slowly but surely screwed the US and world economies into the dirt over the past 30 years or so. The latest example was reported by the NY Times this October 4, 2010 expressing shock and dismay that US corporations have borrowed, at little or no cost, monies "intended" to help the economy recover then bank the money rather than to spend or "invest" it, thereby reaping big profits on mere savings.
Well, Duh!
What in the world should anyone expect a fairly well-educated managerial group to do? OF COURSE they are going to bank the money rather than to spend it (or "invest" it at risk). That is merely sound business practice, unless otherwise required to do something different, which they were not.
This demonstrates a fundamental flaw in the widespread expectation that, somehow, inanimate corporations should manifest altruism and helpful deeds for the "good of the country." This absurd expectation has driven a lot of really stupid policy among both sanctimonious Democrats and protective Republicans. The flip side of this nonsense is the assumption that government oversight of large corporations is somehow unnecessary and debilitating to economic growth. As both of these concepts rest upon the assumption that corporations respond to the "marketplace" (they control) and ARE (or ought to be) inherently altruistic, neither the "socialists" nor the "good capitalists" will disparage that assumption, as it serves the warped viewpoints and vested interests of each side in the debate. And so, because the debate is always absurdly dominated by merely two sides, nothing changes.
I would propose that voters and thinkers (not that they should be considered as separate functions) stop moralizing and fantasizing and then recognize that corporations are NOT inherently altruistic, but that they are (and should be) purely profit-driven entities. Acceptance of that reality would serve to clear up a lot of nonsense that otherwise gets blathered about.
And, because they are purely profit-driven entities, any altruistic influences must come from a governmental structure exclusively dedicated to (1) protecting true competition in the markets, (2) protecting the taxpayers' "investments" in corporate America, and (3) eliminating needless meddling in small businesses. These policies are exactly inverse now. No government--state or federal--protects competition, they protect big business FROM competition. In fact, the states are utterly unequipped to properly monitor the activities of big corporations. Their legislators are easily bought and paid for. And, governments meddle needlessly in small (mostly local) businesses because they must appear to be doing something, and they suffer from misdirected focus and resources which should properly drive oversight of big corporations instead. The laissez-faire "itch," if it must be scratched, should benefit local businesses instead.
The low/no-interest loans made by the Fed to the banks and/or the large corporations should have been made with more strings attached, if made at all, and the extent of that is very much doubtful. Had some of those dollars been instead directly spent by the US government in the rehabilitation of infrastructure, public health and education, the "return on investment" would be manifest in the form of more jobs, EVEN IF the deficit would have been enlarged, which is the problem anyway. President Obama and Fed Chair Ben Bernanke decided, instead, to follow the usual supply-side/top-down model of economic recovery by shoveling practically all of the taxpayers' money out to the large so-called "Wall Street" firms, expecting it to eventually "trickle down" to the benefit of the vast unwashed masses. Right.
President Obama wonders why all that did not work. He wonders why jobless rates are still nosebleed-high. He can blame his own inclination to follow absurd Republican supply-side crap like the good little puppy-dog he is.
THE SOLUTIONS:
(1) Immediately cut the combined FICA tax to 10%. An unknown Republican congressman first suggested this idea, and it would leave more spending money in the pockets of workers as consumers. That, in turn, would allow those workers to spend some money DIRECTLY into local economies which, in turn, would allow local (small) businesses to post some profits and possibly hire more workers. The widely embraced fantasy that Social Security is going broke is not true. A careful reading of the Social Security Trustees' Report from last year would reveal as much. I have read some of it, and I refuse to witlessly parrot the breathless conclusions of the Trustees in their Summary as so many other "experts" have done. Pumping up the payrolls might be enough to keep Social Security IN SURPLUS, AS IT CURRENTLY IS, despite the me-too message of the Chicken-Littles running around worrying about the coming imaginary demise of Social Security.
(2) Revoke the second-home deduction for higher-income brackets and allow, instead, workers to write off apartment rents. That so-called "second-home" mortgage interest deduction has driven the purchase of beach cottages, yachts, mountain cabins, RV's and other nonsense by higher-income taxpayers, all of which qualify as "second homes." Allowing workers to write off apartment rents instead would benefit the lower-bracket taxpayers directly AND it would revive the moribund multi-family housing construction markets, which might create some construction JOBS!
(3) Redirect government regulatory focus away from smaller, local businesses toward larger businesses instead. NOT BECAUSE government is good at business, but because businesses ARE purely profit-driven, and any other influences in the marketplace (like antitrust enforcement) should come from the sector (government) responsible for exerting those influences. Let businesses do their jobs (and expect no more), and let government do its job, which is primarily protecting consumers from hazardous products and practices and monopolies. Democrats, especially, ought to get off the insane merger-&-acquisition trolley they have been seduced into riding for 30 or 40 years now. Our economy does not need less diversification wrought by mergers and acquisitions, it needs much MORE.
(4) Raise income taxes on higher brackets. Let the so-called "Bush" income-tax cuts expire. Why? Because the federal government needs the money, and the rich can afford to pay it. That is it. It has not one damned thing to do with "morality," "fair shares," or "soaking the rich." Wealthier taxpayers do not pay FICA on any salaries above $110,000 nor on dividends, interest or capital gains, capped instead at a measly 15% income-tax rate. Lower-income wage earners pay not only income taxes in excess of 20% on most wage-dollars earned PLUS 6.2% FICA directly (not deductible), and their hapless employers must pony up another 6.2% on every employee's wage or salary under about $110,000, and THAT arguably influences employers to lay off people and buy machines instead. The present REGRESSIVE income-tax structure is an abomination, where wealthier individuals and households are keeping an absolute larger PERCENTAGE (not just dollars) of gross income after taxes and ordinary living expenses than workers. The gross median household income in the US is about $65,000 annually. That is, in most cases, two adult workers per household making less than $35,000 each. That means that HALF of all American households are below that line! Why are we wringing our paws over people making as much as $250,000 annually paying more taxes? The prevailing debate is absurd beyond belief.
(5) Preserve the Estate Tax on estates of $1 Million or more. A $1 Million tax-free estate is more than enough wealth to transfer to those of us who did not earn it. There is no such thing as the cleverly-named "death tax." There is no tax for merely dying. That is ludicrous. Estate taxes are paid with our parents' stupendous wealth. We beneficiaries got our money the old-fashioned way: we inherited it! It might be appropriate to raise the exemptions for individual recipients, and it might be appropriate to lower the brackets, which now start around 45%. If the Estate Tax is preserved, those options should be explored.
(6) Divert remaining TARP and bailout funds toward infrastructure and other make-work projects. We have already seen that individual wealth accumulation does NOT stimulate job growth, as has been argued against raising taxes on wealthier individuals. Income tax brackets were a lot higher when Bill Clinton was President, and the "Bush" tax cuts did not stimulate diddly over the past 9 years or so. Investment stimulation is not what is lacking. Look at General Motors, for example. There is no shortage of capital investment in General Motors, but they are STILL struggling to sell their products. More capital investment in General Motors is NOT going to induce more people to buy their cars, if those people have no jobs and no spending money, not even if they can get zero-interest loans! The workers are NOT going to borrow money to buy stuff. Those days are OVER! What General Motors (as do other large corporations, the real estate markets, and local businesses) all need is more BUYERS with more spending money in their pockets. That is the ONLY way that real job growth is going to happen. The true remedies are bottom-up, not top-down.
(7) There may be a valid point to eliminating corporate taxation, because it is persuasively argued that taxes on all corporations become a pass-through expense, a rising tide that lifts all corporate "boats" and are passed on to consumers. Corporate-entity taxation was, at one time, regarded as a proper trade-off for the guarantee of limited liability for investors. Just ask the hapless partners who invested as such in the famous insurance company, "Lloyd's of London," when there was a capital call on all partners a few years ago for money to cover excessive claims paid. Lloyd's was not incorporated back then. Today we have "S" corporations and limited-liability companies that effectively evade the so-called "double-taxation" issue faced by with "C" corporations, where net profits earned are taxed, then paid out as dividends and taxed again to the individual recipient. But the "double-taxation" issue is a bogus issue, because most gross income received by a taxable entity is paid out in wages, salaries, loan interest or capital investments, all of which is allowed either a direct deduction or a depreciation deduction. Only non-deductible dividends are again subjected to individual income taxes, yet those other deductible expenditures are mostly taxable income to those recipients as well! A better course of action might be to examine possible income-tax-exemption of ALL businesses, regardless of form, and to tax all net receipts therefrom at full individual rates.
(8) Instead of cutting taxes on capital gains when prior investments are liquidated, it might be better to allow a sliding-scale-refundable tax credit on capital investments. Repeal of the long-term capital-gains tax rate should be considered, replacing it instead with a capital-investment incentive that would be recaptured at ordinary income-tax rates if the investment were liquidated prematurely, using a sliding scale that would penalize earlier liquidations more than later liquidations. An immediately recognizable tax credit for capital investments could completely avoid recovery by taxation if allowed to remain in place for a designated period of time, like seven years, with ordinary taxation of the entire amount of capital gains levied anytime, and recovery of the previously allowed tax credit required on a sliding-scale percentage if liquidated in the interim. Certain exemptions for liquidations mandated by such matters as health crises or payment of estate taxes could be incorporated.
There are ways to address our economic problems, but the present course of action being pursued by the Obama Administration is doomed to fail. Workers need good jobs, and this is no secret. The Obama Administration has been mining fool's gold, trying to make the old nonsense work. That is because the same Usual Suspects remain in Washington to give bogus "expert" supply-side advice to succeeding administrations, as presidents come and go. President Obama needs to find some new blood, some totally new thinking, and jettison the Usual Suspects.
All rights reserved.
Barack Obama's Administration and the Chair of the Federal Reserve continue to pursue the sort of "supply-side"/"free-market capitalism" nonsense that has slowly but surely screwed the US and world economies into the dirt over the past 30 years or so. The latest example was reported by the NY Times this October 4, 2010 expressing shock and dismay that US corporations have borrowed, at little or no cost, monies "intended" to help the economy recover then bank the money rather than to spend or "invest" it, thereby reaping big profits on mere savings.
Well, Duh!
What in the world should anyone expect a fairly well-educated managerial group to do? OF COURSE they are going to bank the money rather than to spend it (or "invest" it at risk). That is merely sound business practice, unless otherwise required to do something different, which they were not.
This demonstrates a fundamental flaw in the widespread expectation that, somehow, inanimate corporations should manifest altruism and helpful deeds for the "good of the country." This absurd expectation has driven a lot of really stupid policy among both sanctimonious Democrats and protective Republicans. The flip side of this nonsense is the assumption that government oversight of large corporations is somehow unnecessary and debilitating to economic growth. As both of these concepts rest upon the assumption that corporations respond to the "marketplace" (they control) and ARE (or ought to be) inherently altruistic, neither the "socialists" nor the "good capitalists" will disparage that assumption, as it serves the warped viewpoints and vested interests of each side in the debate. And so, because the debate is always absurdly dominated by merely two sides, nothing changes.
I would propose that voters and thinkers (not that they should be considered as separate functions) stop moralizing and fantasizing and then recognize that corporations are NOT inherently altruistic, but that they are (and should be) purely profit-driven entities. Acceptance of that reality would serve to clear up a lot of nonsense that otherwise gets blathered about.
And, because they are purely profit-driven entities, any altruistic influences must come from a governmental structure exclusively dedicated to (1) protecting true competition in the markets, (2) protecting the taxpayers' "investments" in corporate America, and (3) eliminating needless meddling in small businesses. These policies are exactly inverse now. No government--state or federal--protects competition, they protect big business FROM competition. In fact, the states are utterly unequipped to properly monitor the activities of big corporations. Their legislators are easily bought and paid for. And, governments meddle needlessly in small (mostly local) businesses because they must appear to be doing something, and they suffer from misdirected focus and resources which should properly drive oversight of big corporations instead. The laissez-faire "itch," if it must be scratched, should benefit local businesses instead.
The low/no-interest loans made by the Fed to the banks and/or the large corporations should have been made with more strings attached, if made at all, and the extent of that is very much doubtful. Had some of those dollars been instead directly spent by the US government in the rehabilitation of infrastructure, public health and education, the "return on investment" would be manifest in the form of more jobs, EVEN IF the deficit would have been enlarged, which is the problem anyway. President Obama and Fed Chair Ben Bernanke decided, instead, to follow the usual supply-side/top-down model of economic recovery by shoveling practically all of the taxpayers' money out to the large so-called "Wall Street" firms, expecting it to eventually "trickle down" to the benefit of the vast unwashed masses. Right.
President Obama wonders why all that did not work. He wonders why jobless rates are still nosebleed-high. He can blame his own inclination to follow absurd Republican supply-side crap like the good little puppy-dog he is.
THE SOLUTIONS:
(1) Immediately cut the combined FICA tax to 10%. An unknown Republican congressman first suggested this idea, and it would leave more spending money in the pockets of workers as consumers. That, in turn, would allow those workers to spend some money DIRECTLY into local economies which, in turn, would allow local (small) businesses to post some profits and possibly hire more workers. The widely embraced fantasy that Social Security is going broke is not true. A careful reading of the Social Security Trustees' Report from last year would reveal as much. I have read some of it, and I refuse to witlessly parrot the breathless conclusions of the Trustees in their Summary as so many other "experts" have done. Pumping up the payrolls might be enough to keep Social Security IN SURPLUS, AS IT CURRENTLY IS, despite the me-too message of the Chicken-Littles running around worrying about the coming imaginary demise of Social Security.
(2) Revoke the second-home deduction for higher-income brackets and allow, instead, workers to write off apartment rents. That so-called "second-home" mortgage interest deduction has driven the purchase of beach cottages, yachts, mountain cabins, RV's and other nonsense by higher-income taxpayers, all of which qualify as "second homes." Allowing workers to write off apartment rents instead would benefit the lower-bracket taxpayers directly AND it would revive the moribund multi-family housing construction markets, which might create some construction JOBS!
(3) Redirect government regulatory focus away from smaller, local businesses toward larger businesses instead. NOT BECAUSE government is good at business, but because businesses ARE purely profit-driven, and any other influences in the marketplace (like antitrust enforcement) should come from the sector (government) responsible for exerting those influences. Let businesses do their jobs (and expect no more), and let government do its job, which is primarily protecting consumers from hazardous products and practices and monopolies. Democrats, especially, ought to get off the insane merger-&-acquisition trolley they have been seduced into riding for 30 or 40 years now. Our economy does not need less diversification wrought by mergers and acquisitions, it needs much MORE.
(4) Raise income taxes on higher brackets. Let the so-called "Bush" income-tax cuts expire. Why? Because the federal government needs the money, and the rich can afford to pay it. That is it. It has not one damned thing to do with "morality," "fair shares," or "soaking the rich." Wealthier taxpayers do not pay FICA on any salaries above $110,000 nor on dividends, interest or capital gains, capped instead at a measly 15% income-tax rate. Lower-income wage earners pay not only income taxes in excess of 20% on most wage-dollars earned PLUS 6.2% FICA directly (not deductible), and their hapless employers must pony up another 6.2% on every employee's wage or salary under about $110,000, and THAT arguably influences employers to lay off people and buy machines instead. The present REGRESSIVE income-tax structure is an abomination, where wealthier individuals and households are keeping an absolute larger PERCENTAGE (not just dollars) of gross income after taxes and ordinary living expenses than workers. The gross median household income in the US is about $65,000 annually. That is, in most cases, two adult workers per household making less than $35,000 each. That means that HALF of all American households are below that line! Why are we wringing our paws over people making as much as $250,000 annually paying more taxes? The prevailing debate is absurd beyond belief.
(5) Preserve the Estate Tax on estates of $1 Million or more. A $1 Million tax-free estate is more than enough wealth to transfer to those of us who did not earn it. There is no such thing as the cleverly-named "death tax." There is no tax for merely dying. That is ludicrous. Estate taxes are paid with our parents' stupendous wealth. We beneficiaries got our money the old-fashioned way: we inherited it! It might be appropriate to raise the exemptions for individual recipients, and it might be appropriate to lower the brackets, which now start around 45%. If the Estate Tax is preserved, those options should be explored.
(6) Divert remaining TARP and bailout funds toward infrastructure and other make-work projects. We have already seen that individual wealth accumulation does NOT stimulate job growth, as has been argued against raising taxes on wealthier individuals. Income tax brackets were a lot higher when Bill Clinton was President, and the "Bush" tax cuts did not stimulate diddly over the past 9 years or so. Investment stimulation is not what is lacking. Look at General Motors, for example. There is no shortage of capital investment in General Motors, but they are STILL struggling to sell their products. More capital investment in General Motors is NOT going to induce more people to buy their cars, if those people have no jobs and no spending money, not even if they can get zero-interest loans! The workers are NOT going to borrow money to buy stuff. Those days are OVER! What General Motors (as do other large corporations, the real estate markets, and local businesses) all need is more BUYERS with more spending money in their pockets. That is the ONLY way that real job growth is going to happen. The true remedies are bottom-up, not top-down.
(7) There may be a valid point to eliminating corporate taxation, because it is persuasively argued that taxes on all corporations become a pass-through expense, a rising tide that lifts all corporate "boats" and are passed on to consumers. Corporate-entity taxation was, at one time, regarded as a proper trade-off for the guarantee of limited liability for investors. Just ask the hapless partners who invested as such in the famous insurance company, "Lloyd's of London," when there was a capital call on all partners a few years ago for money to cover excessive claims paid. Lloyd's was not incorporated back then. Today we have "S" corporations and limited-liability companies that effectively evade the so-called "double-taxation" issue faced by with "C" corporations, where net profits earned are taxed, then paid out as dividends and taxed again to the individual recipient. But the "double-taxation" issue is a bogus issue, because most gross income received by a taxable entity is paid out in wages, salaries, loan interest or capital investments, all of which is allowed either a direct deduction or a depreciation deduction. Only non-deductible dividends are again subjected to individual income taxes, yet those other deductible expenditures are mostly taxable income to those recipients as well! A better course of action might be to examine possible income-tax-exemption of ALL businesses, regardless of form, and to tax all net receipts therefrom at full individual rates.
(8) Instead of cutting taxes on capital gains when prior investments are liquidated, it might be better to allow a sliding-scale-refundable tax credit on capital investments. Repeal of the long-term capital-gains tax rate should be considered, replacing it instead with a capital-investment incentive that would be recaptured at ordinary income-tax rates if the investment were liquidated prematurely, using a sliding scale that would penalize earlier liquidations more than later liquidations. An immediately recognizable tax credit for capital investments could completely avoid recovery by taxation if allowed to remain in place for a designated period of time, like seven years, with ordinary taxation of the entire amount of capital gains levied anytime, and recovery of the previously allowed tax credit required on a sliding-scale percentage if liquidated in the interim. Certain exemptions for liquidations mandated by such matters as health crises or payment of estate taxes could be incorporated.
There are ways to address our economic problems, but the present course of action being pursued by the Obama Administration is doomed to fail. Workers need good jobs, and this is no secret. The Obama Administration has been mining fool's gold, trying to make the old nonsense work. That is because the same Usual Suspects remain in Washington to give bogus "expert" supply-side advice to succeeding administrations, as presidents come and go. President Obama needs to find some new blood, some totally new thinking, and jettison the Usual Suspects.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
WHEN THE FAT LADY SINGS
(Part of the following was e-mailed to a friend who had collated stats on a trivia quiz.)
Recently I was reminded again of widespread cultural deprivations on matters we Baby-Boomers now take for granted. Today's kids and even younger adults seem terribly isolated now from the many cultural things that we used to share with adults, like cartoons, especially the Warner Bros./Bugs Bunny/Porky Pig/Daffy Duck/Elmer Fudd stuff. Those wonderful cartoons were effective on two levels, both for kids and adults. The "double-entendre" and satirical stuff only adults might get, but they were powerful latent influences for kids our age as well.
Totally hilarious! AND, THAT is how I "know" Wagnerian opera and how I know what the "fat lady" phrase means. I have known that ever since I first heard the phrase, INSTANTLY! I knew it as a kid. Do today's children know any of that? I doubt it. That is just but one of many examples, and I have no idea how we might infuse that cultural knowledge into anyone. Today's cartoons are an abomination. I would NEVER let a child of mine watch such crap. NEVER!
We just had to "be" there, and I am really grateful I was.
Recently I was reminded again of widespread cultural deprivations on matters we Baby-Boomers now take for granted. Today's kids and even younger adults seem terribly isolated now from the many cultural things that we used to share with adults, like cartoons, especially the Warner Bros./Bugs Bunny/Porky Pig/Daffy Duck/Elmer Fudd stuff. Those wonderful cartoons were effective on two levels, both for kids and adults. The "double-entendre" and satirical stuff only adults might get, but they were powerful latent influences for kids our age as well.
FOR EXAMPLE:
The phrase, "it ain't over 'til the fat lady sings" is an obvious reference to amply-built Kirsten Flagstad's performances in Wagnerian operas. However, I have never seen a Wagner opera in full tilt. I have seen some film clips of Flagstad's performances in the horned helmet and blonde braids, etc., but only in passing. HOWEVER, I have seen “What’s Opera, Doc,” a 1957 Bugs Bunny cartoon featuring Elmer Fudd singing the Götterdämmerung with the ever-stronger lyric, "Kill de wabbit!” Bugs is, of course, attractively dolled up with horned helmet, breastplates and blonde pigtails, singing the Lied as Flagstad did!
We just had to "be" there, and I am really grateful I was.
Friday, July 2, 2010
PARTIAL-BIRTH ABORTION
Elena Kagan, Solicitor-General of the United States and former Dean of the Harvard University Law School, has been nominated by President Obama to the US Supreme Court to take the seat of retiring Justice John Paul Stevens.
I am uncertain of Kagan's commitment to personal liberty, which is the most important quality a Supreme Court justice should have, in my opinion. Among other matters, she has been credited with fashioning the legislative compromise on "partial-birth abortion" when she worked for the Clinton Administration. My problem with the whole "partial-birth" abortion thing is that it was dishonestly presented as a procedure whereby perfectly healthy babies were being wantonly killed off in late-term pregnancy. "Partial-birth" abortion is not even a recognized medical procedure.
The correct medical term is "dilation and extraction"--"D&X"--and it is performed whenever a fetus is "anencephalic," which is a fetus that forms without a brain, and the skull is filled with fluid and thus too large to SAFELY pass thru the birth canal. The D&X procedure allows the attending to drain the fluid by puncturing the skull and deliver the poor brainless fetus normally without having to perform a somewhat dangerous Caesarian, which will now be required in the case of an anencephalic fetus in all cases because the D&X is now outlawed. Had perfectly healthy babies been killed off as alleged, I think we would have heard about it from horrified healthcare personnel long before now. I have never heard of such an provable instance.
I fault the healthcare professions for not speaking out against the political "tsunami" when these matters were pending in the Congress and state legislatures. Most tucked their tails between their legs and scurried for cover, there being a shocking lack of courage and intellectual honesty on their part.
Much of what has stirred the "booboisee" up on this issue is the Big Lie writ large, once again.
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
ACCOMMODATING TYRANNY?
In 1964, as a graduating high-school senior, I was opposed to the public-accommodations section of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Rand Paul, an ophthalmologist and candidate for the US Senate from Kentucky, has made some recent comments about that which have stirred up a very unpleasant memory. I cringe to admit what my thinking was back then.
As a product of very conservative instruction on American government in my senior high-school year, I was focused solely on the consideration of the owners of “public” businesses being controlled by the federal government in deciding whom they would serve in their eating or lodging establishments. I was indifferent to the very real suffering of those who were denied such service solely because of their skin color. I was obsessed with whether or not the “Commerce Clause” legally authorized the federal government to intrude into local commerce. The Commerce Clause in the US Constitution authorizes Congress to regulate “interstate” commerce, and the US Supreme Court confirmed that includes most public accommodations as regulated under the Act.
Fast-forward about eight or nine years, and my thinking had undergone some considerable revision, probably due to some very timely and welcome legal education. No longer was I willing to make legal excuses for bigots. Ironically, my recent thinking has been hardened even further by the dust-up over the federal mandate to purchase health insurance from private vendors in the recently adopted healthcare law, which I think is unconstitutional because I do not believe it is a proper exercise of the powers set forth in the “Commerce Clause.”
These seeming contradictions can be best explained (from my point of view) by noting that “commerce” is, by definition, a “public” activity. It seems clear to me that the Congress can require that anyone who CHOOSES to enter the marketplace (as a seller or buyer) must play by the rules of fairness. Given his obvious stale obsessions with the well-settled 1964 Civil Rights Act, Rand Paul should have already analyzed this situation to provide him with a firm position on the matter. Instead, he hemmed and hawed and dissembled about the validity of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and he winds up looking like the buffoon he obviously is.
Watching the crowd on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” the other day, several were excuse-mongering about Paul’s status as a “mere” ophthalmologist who might well have a poor understanding of the law. But Senate candidate Paul willingly chose to take and express an extreme position on the law based upon a thoroughly discredited line of thinking, in which case, as an obviously well-educated, intelligent Board-certified ophthalmologist, he should have been prepared to defend his point of view. That he flip-flopped on the matter demonstrates that he is not ready for prime time. Any Kentucky voter who votes for Paul hereafter is a fool.
As for the healthcare law, while Congress obviously has the power to demand fairness from those who choose to enter the marketplace, to my memory it has never exercised power to force private individuals to enter the marketplace and have business dealings with other private entities. This will be banged out in the courts, and properly so, but I reject the analogy of auto liability (not collision nor comprehensive) insurance because those who choose to avoid use of the roads are not required to buy such insurance, and those programs are established under state law, not federal law. The 10th Amendment draws a significant distinction between state and federal authority, not that very many voters, journalists, politicians or judges seem to care these days.
I am deeply sorry for failing to recognize the pain and suffering that my stingy analysis of the 1964 Civil Rights Act disregarded so long ago. I am grateful I finally saw the light. There is a big legal difference between the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the healthcare law.
Sunday, May 2, 2010
PLEASE, DADDY!
This is going to be a tough essay to write. I have lived for almost 64 years, and I am just now getting around to putting down on "paper" what has become probably the most terrifying memory that I have, listening to my drunken father threatening to come upstairs and kill my 11-year-old self as I lay in my bed, presumably sleeping, but actually eavesdropping in abject horror on his drunken rantings.
I STILL, to this day, have in my bedside table drawer (the same table I had by my bed as a child) the cast-iron swag-lamp counterweight that I kept handy after the swag-lamp fell apart. I was determined to whack my Old Man in the head as hard as I could if he dared show his drunken mug in my bedroom. I truly believed he would make good on his threats, and I was as prepared as I could be. If I faked being asleep, perhaps I could take him by surprise and beat his fucking brains out before he was able to do something to me. I was as serious as a heart attack. I had resolved to beat his head as many times as I could with the counterweight. I knew I had to kill him first before he killed me.
I spent about 5 years coping with this, from about Age 11 to Age 16, in rural North Carolina. I entered boarding school right after my 16th birthday, so all I had to fear then were my schoolmates! My father's drunken threats were not happening every night, but it was random enough to keep me on my toes all the time.
My father was a pretty nice person if he was not drunk, but if he WAS drunk, then he was like Mr. Hyde to Dr. Jekyll. My mother was worthless; he would beat the shit out of her if she got in his way. I used to surreptitiously watch him do that. I should have killed him anyway, like the mad dog he was! She was a horrible enabler in any event, wishing to keep surface appearances smooth, but that was typical of the times.
As the oldest, with his name and same birth-date, I think I reminded him of himself, and as he was obviously into self-loathing, it manifested as a death wish on me. He was really fucked up. If I look back on it, I think his father probably ignored him unless he was being punished. I think his father was a royal prick. But, those are after-the-fact speculations. I was not given to that much in-depth analysis when I was a child.
My father was a raging "juice-freak," an alcoholic, and I am sorry for that burden he had to carry. He quit drinking about two years before dying right after his 60th birthday in 1977 (about 8 days after Elvis!), but he was an overweight, heavy smoker, and it got him. I am fat now, but I don't smoke, thankfully. I like my beer, but I don't get drunk anymore, though I have done so in the past. I don't want to walk in his shoes.
As for forgiveness, I readily accept the necessity of doing that to free myself from the grip of this terror that still rages in my memory, but I am not there yet. Some years thereafter he tried to assault me while drunk, and I beat his ass horribly. I beat him until he stayed away from me. I was about 22 years old at the time. He never threatened or fucked with me thereafter. Served him right.
I won't forgive him. Not yet. Maybe never. If you think I should well, fuck you, too!
I STILL, to this day, have in my bedside table drawer (the same table I had by my bed as a child) the cast-iron swag-lamp counterweight that I kept handy after the swag-lamp fell apart. I was determined to whack my Old Man in the head as hard as I could if he dared show his drunken mug in my bedroom. I truly believed he would make good on his threats, and I was as prepared as I could be. If I faked being asleep, perhaps I could take him by surprise and beat his fucking brains out before he was able to do something to me. I was as serious as a heart attack. I had resolved to beat his head as many times as I could with the counterweight. I knew I had to kill him first before he killed me.
I spent about 5 years coping with this, from about Age 11 to Age 16, in rural North Carolina. I entered boarding school right after my 16th birthday, so all I had to fear then were my schoolmates! My father's drunken threats were not happening every night, but it was random enough to keep me on my toes all the time.
My father was a pretty nice person if he was not drunk, but if he WAS drunk, then he was like Mr. Hyde to Dr. Jekyll. My mother was worthless; he would beat the shit out of her if she got in his way. I used to surreptitiously watch him do that. I should have killed him anyway, like the mad dog he was! She was a horrible enabler in any event, wishing to keep surface appearances smooth, but that was typical of the times.
As the oldest, with his name and same birth-date, I think I reminded him of himself, and as he was obviously into self-loathing, it manifested as a death wish on me. He was really fucked up. If I look back on it, I think his father probably ignored him unless he was being punished. I think his father was a royal prick. But, those are after-the-fact speculations. I was not given to that much in-depth analysis when I was a child.
My father was a raging "juice-freak," an alcoholic, and I am sorry for that burden he had to carry. He quit drinking about two years before dying right after his 60th birthday in 1977 (about 8 days after Elvis!), but he was an overweight, heavy smoker, and it got him. I am fat now, but I don't smoke, thankfully. I like my beer, but I don't get drunk anymore, though I have done so in the past. I don't want to walk in his shoes.
As for forgiveness, I readily accept the necessity of doing that to free myself from the grip of this terror that still rages in my memory, but I am not there yet. Some years thereafter he tried to assault me while drunk, and I beat his ass horribly. I beat him until he stayed away from me. I was about 22 years old at the time. He never threatened or fucked with me thereafter. Served him right.
I won't forgive him. Not yet. Maybe never. If you think I should well, fuck you, too!
Saturday, May 1, 2010
MY LOVELY AFTERNOON
(From personal experience, (c) April 29, 2010, all rights reserved.)
I was cutting grass one beautiful, cool April afternoon down in a field behind my garage, mowing the path that runs through that field to my barn. There is a "wet spot" there that is usually soft and muddy, and I tried to "power" through it but got stuck about 6:00 PM. My mower, a huge, heavy zero-turn-radius Diesel mower with a 72" cutting deck, has turf tires and gets stuck very easily. I was royally pissed off.
Sulking and feeling sorry for myself, I trudged all the way up to the house and lay down in my recliner to drink a beer and nurture a righteous pity party, then I suddenly realized I could not just leave the mower where it was, BECAUSE the left rear tire was leaking and consistently going flat, and I was going to have one hell of a mess if I left it there overnight, thereby allowing the tire to go flat in the mudhole, as it most probably would do. I HAD to get it unstuck before dark and bring it up to my workshop where my air compressor reposes. That way, I could pump up the tire AGAIN the next day, as I must about every 2 days or so. I would not be able to get it repaired until the following Monday, having to jack up the mower, chock the wheels and remove the rear wheel over the weekend, then take it to the tire shop about 40 miles away, PROVIDED I got the yard mowed first, which normally takes about 3-1/2 hours.
NOTHING IS SIMPLE.
That very morning I had dropped off my truck (with towing chain in the toolbox) at a dealership to be worked on, so I did not have the towing chain. So, cursing and muttering at the unfairness of it all, I reluctantly went back outside, climbed up on my tractor and drove it down into the field with a web-nylon strap and a spare hitch ball stuck in the drag bar on the tractor. I did not even have a big nut to hold the hitch ball on the drag bar. There was nowhere else on the tractor on which to hook the web-strap!
After backing the tractor up to the mower, I got down, looped the strap around the front axle and the other end looped onto the hitch ball on the drag bar, then I heaved my body back up onto the tractor and dragged the mower sort of sideways out of the mudhole. I backed up the tractor slightly to relieve the tension on the strap, got down off the tractor again, locked the brake on the mower and removed the nylon strap from the hitch-ball, which strap was now CONVENIENTLY pinched in a vertical caster shaft on the front axle! (The front mower wheels are like big casters.) Eventually freeing the strap, I then climbed back onto the tractor, moved it about 50 ft. away, climbed down, got on the mower, started it and finished mowing the grass in the immediate vicinity. (I kept the tractor handy in case I got the mower stuck again.) I then got off the FUCKING mower, climbed back onto the tractor and drove it up into the yard and parked it, where it still sits. Then I walked back down to the mower, finished cutting the area, and then drove it up to the shop and parked it by the compressor. WHEW!
It was getting cold and dark by then (I had found ice in the truck bed that morning), so I got all that drudgery done in the nick of time. I really had not wanted to go back out there and do all that after going into the house the first time, but I knew it would be a royal mess the next day if I did not. I had argued with myself internally for about 30 minutes! The self-pity was almost crippling! I was truly surprised at myself for actually going back out there and getting it done, considering how much I had NOT wanted to do it!
I had been hoping it would fix itself, but unfortunately, those things rarely happen. I still had most of the yard left to mow, including taking a hard run at the mint patch which is always soft and muddy. I have gotten stuck therein several times. Unfortunately, when one hits a mudhole, the momentum of that mower dies like a miner in a Massey coal mine. It is like smacking a brick wall!
If one must purchase a riding lawn mower, do NOT trust turf tires. They are worthless. They were obviously designed by someone who has NEVER had to cut his own grass. Get the great big knobby tractor-style tires instead.
I was cutting grass one beautiful, cool April afternoon down in a field behind my garage, mowing the path that runs through that field to my barn. There is a "wet spot" there that is usually soft and muddy, and I tried to "power" through it but got stuck about 6:00 PM. My mower, a huge, heavy zero-turn-radius Diesel mower with a 72" cutting deck, has turf tires and gets stuck very easily. I was royally pissed off.
Sulking and feeling sorry for myself, I trudged all the way up to the house and lay down in my recliner to drink a beer and nurture a righteous pity party, then I suddenly realized I could not just leave the mower where it was, BECAUSE the left rear tire was leaking and consistently going flat, and I was going to have one hell of a mess if I left it there overnight, thereby allowing the tire to go flat in the mudhole, as it most probably would do. I HAD to get it unstuck before dark and bring it up to my workshop where my air compressor reposes. That way, I could pump up the tire AGAIN the next day, as I must about every 2 days or so. I would not be able to get it repaired until the following Monday, having to jack up the mower, chock the wheels and remove the rear wheel over the weekend, then take it to the tire shop about 40 miles away, PROVIDED I got the yard mowed first, which normally takes about 3-1/2 hours.
NOTHING IS SIMPLE.
That very morning I had dropped off my truck (with towing chain in the toolbox) at a dealership to be worked on, so I did not have the towing chain. So, cursing and muttering at the unfairness of it all, I reluctantly went back outside, climbed up on my tractor and drove it down into the field with a web-nylon strap and a spare hitch ball stuck in the drag bar on the tractor. I did not even have a big nut to hold the hitch ball on the drag bar. There was nowhere else on the tractor on which to hook the web-strap!
After backing the tractor up to the mower, I got down, looped the strap around the front axle and the other end looped onto the hitch ball on the drag bar, then I heaved my body back up onto the tractor and dragged the mower sort of sideways out of the mudhole. I backed up the tractor slightly to relieve the tension on the strap, got down off the tractor again, locked the brake on the mower and removed the nylon strap from the hitch-ball, which strap was now CONVENIENTLY pinched in a vertical caster shaft on the front axle! (The front mower wheels are like big casters.) Eventually freeing the strap, I then climbed back onto the tractor, moved it about 50 ft. away, climbed down, got on the mower, started it and finished mowing the grass in the immediate vicinity. (I kept the tractor handy in case I got the mower stuck again.) I then got off the FUCKING mower, climbed back onto the tractor and drove it up into the yard and parked it, where it still sits. Then I walked back down to the mower, finished cutting the area, and then drove it up to the shop and parked it by the compressor. WHEW!
It was getting cold and dark by then (I had found ice in the truck bed that morning), so I got all that drudgery done in the nick of time. I really had not wanted to go back out there and do all that after going into the house the first time, but I knew it would be a royal mess the next day if I did not. I had argued with myself internally for about 30 minutes! The self-pity was almost crippling! I was truly surprised at myself for actually going back out there and getting it done, considering how much I had NOT wanted to do it!
I had been hoping it would fix itself, but unfortunately, those things rarely happen. I still had most of the yard left to mow, including taking a hard run at the mint patch which is always soft and muddy. I have gotten stuck therein several times. Unfortunately, when one hits a mudhole, the momentum of that mower dies like a miner in a Massey coal mine. It is like smacking a brick wall!
If one must purchase a riding lawn mower, do NOT trust turf tires. They are worthless. They were obviously designed by someone who has NEVER had to cut his own grass. Get the great big knobby tractor-style tires instead.
Thursday, April 29, 2010
MY ALTRUISM IS BIGGER THAN YOUR ALTRUISM
(c) 4/28/10
All rights reserved.
Altruism. It is a wonderful quality we hope to find in others that is usually so sorely lacking in ourselves, despite the contrary self-images we carefully nurture. It is frequently manifested in our disgust at professional athlete and entertainer compensation, union-worker benefits and business behaviors. Altruism is the Holy Grail of self-denial. We expect--NO! We DEMAND that the aforementioned groups forego their filthy lucre so that the imaginary society we envision will be better off. That is about as realistic as the likelihood we will refuse an offered raise at the workplace.
The most frequent complaint heard these days is about the predatory behavior in the marketplace of businesses gobbling profits and paying out huge salaries and bonuses. The public outrage against such notables as Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and others is stunning. The perennial complaint against union workers is also frequently aired, with their presumed featherbedding, shoddy workmanship and excessive retirement and healthcare benefits which are ruining otherwise-profitable businesses and contributing to the inflation that is surely eating us alive.
What nonsense!
FIRST of all, it is patently absurd to demand of others a self-denial that we would never employ for ourselves. It is ludicrous to expect athletes, entertainers, union workers and businesses to piously refuse the money and benefits spread before them. I know of no one who would be so stupid as to do such a thing.
The answer is GOVERNMENT REGULATION. Businesses are SUPPOSED to be profit-seeking. That is their sole reason for existence. Any business that operates otherwise is doomed to fail. Therefore, the only remedy for any overreaching is to REGULATE the marketplace in which those businesses operate. That is why antitrust laws were enacted. That is why Glass-Steagall (revoked in the late 1990's with the connivance of Pres. Bill Clinton) was originally adopted. An unregulated marketplace is NOT going to address the problems of overreaching if all players are allowed to overreach. It is patently stupid to think otherwise.
As for union benefits, it is well to remember that unions did not gain a thing not agreed to by management. If union benefits are excessive, then it is up to management to refuse. The threat of a strike does not provide an excuse to abandon shrewd negotiations, as self-pitying management types would have us believe. It reminds me of the slogan of a used-car dealer that used to operate in Richmond, Virginia: "I would GIVE 'em away, but my wife won't let me!" Or, perhaps more apt, the late comedian Flip Wilson's Geraldine Defense: "The DEVIL made me do it!"
We must abandon the expectation that others should manifest altruism "for the good of society" and start regulating excessive conduct. Corporate management must re-learn the meaning of "no." Businesses should be wrest from the control of MBA's and IT-types who are inflicted with tunnel vision, so that the big picture of how businesses truly operate can again become the dominant philosophy.
All rights reserved.
Altruism. It is a wonderful quality we hope to find in others that is usually so sorely lacking in ourselves, despite the contrary self-images we carefully nurture. It is frequently manifested in our disgust at professional athlete and entertainer compensation, union-worker benefits and business behaviors. Altruism is the Holy Grail of self-denial. We expect--NO! We DEMAND that the aforementioned groups forego their filthy lucre so that the imaginary society we envision will be better off. That is about as realistic as the likelihood we will refuse an offered raise at the workplace.
The most frequent complaint heard these days is about the predatory behavior in the marketplace of businesses gobbling profits and paying out huge salaries and bonuses. The public outrage against such notables as Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and others is stunning. The perennial complaint against union workers is also frequently aired, with their presumed featherbedding, shoddy workmanship and excessive retirement and healthcare benefits which are ruining otherwise-profitable businesses and contributing to the inflation that is surely eating us alive.
What nonsense!
FIRST of all, it is patently absurd to demand of others a self-denial that we would never employ for ourselves. It is ludicrous to expect athletes, entertainers, union workers and businesses to piously refuse the money and benefits spread before them. I know of no one who would be so stupid as to do such a thing.
The answer is GOVERNMENT REGULATION. Businesses are SUPPOSED to be profit-seeking. That is their sole reason for existence. Any business that operates otherwise is doomed to fail. Therefore, the only remedy for any overreaching is to REGULATE the marketplace in which those businesses operate. That is why antitrust laws were enacted. That is why Glass-Steagall (revoked in the late 1990's with the connivance of Pres. Bill Clinton) was originally adopted. An unregulated marketplace is NOT going to address the problems of overreaching if all players are allowed to overreach. It is patently stupid to think otherwise.
As for union benefits, it is well to remember that unions did not gain a thing not agreed to by management. If union benefits are excessive, then it is up to management to refuse. The threat of a strike does not provide an excuse to abandon shrewd negotiations, as self-pitying management types would have us believe. It reminds me of the slogan of a used-car dealer that used to operate in Richmond, Virginia: "I would GIVE 'em away, but my wife won't let me!" Or, perhaps more apt, the late comedian Flip Wilson's Geraldine Defense: "The DEVIL made me do it!"
We must abandon the expectation that others should manifest altruism "for the good of society" and start regulating excessive conduct. Corporate management must re-learn the meaning of "no." Businesses should be wrest from the control of MBA's and IT-types who are inflicted with tunnel vision, so that the big picture of how businesses truly operate can again become the dominant philosophy.
Monday, April 19, 2010
LEES vs. JACKSONS
{The following was published by the Richmond (Va.) Times-Dispatch on April 16, 2010 in response to an earlier letter from L. H. Ginn, III criticizing the decision of his alma mater, St. Christopher's School of Richmond, Virginia, to change the names of the two school debating societies from "Lees" and "Jacksons" to "Reds" and "Grays," relating to the school's colors.)
L. H. Ginn, III, of the St. Christopher's School Class of 1951, expressed his indignation on April 7 that the School had dropped the names of Confederate Generals Robert E. Lee and "Stonewall" Jackson for its Literary Societies, changing them to the "Reds" and "Grays," of which I approve. There is simply no point any longer in attempting to commemorate loser Confederate generals these days and times. It is past time to "get over it."
Now, as one who thinks the Arthur Ashe statue is out of place on Monument Avenue (placed there as a cheap sop to "racial balance" and an offense to the memory of Arthur Ashe), I must also acknowledge that the decisions of Lee and Jackson to resign their US Army officer commissions are understandable, as neither wanted to take up arms against their native state, Virginia. BUT--their actions did not stop with mere resignation.
Both men, as US Army officers and graduates of West Point, apparently had sworn oaths numerous times to oppose all enemies of the United States, "foreign and domestic," but they each affirmatively chose to violate the last part of that oath by foolishly becoming Confederate combat generals. I simply do not understand how an honorable person can do such a thing, and I have not found in the writings of either an explanation of this seeming contradiction. Their respective questionable Civil-War records are irrelevant to this point, as are the "Vietnam [undeclared] War" and the "Gulf [undeclared] War" and so forth. Much ado about nothing.
I am well aware of the various local controversies about the Flood Wall images and Monument Avenue, but none of that should allow any assumption that the opinions of Mr. Ginn are shared by all graduates of St. Christopher's School.
****************************
The writer is a 1964 graduate of St. Christopher's School in Richmond and a 1973 graduate of the School of Law at Washington & Lee University.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
HIDE THE MONEY
© 2/28/10
All rights reserved.
[This was originally submitted to the Goochland (County, Va.) Gazette, which chose to ignore it.]
FOUR MILLION DOLLARS!
That's right: almost $4 Million is what was NOT collected in 2008 in Goochland County land taxes because of the Land-Use Tax deferral program that has been in place for about 30 years. The "nick" for 2009 is probably a bit higher.
BUT--those monies are not being forfeited into thin air by the County. The County gets its "pound of flesh" from other taxpayers: homeowners and business owners, for example. Because, what is NOT collected from one place MUST be collected from some other place, regardless of what the County is spending, because the County cannot print its own money. There is no "free lunch" in Goochland County.
Here are some interesting recent facts about the land-use tax "deferrals" in Goochland County:
The aggregate "deferred" land values are over $749 Million.
Almost $4 Million were the tax revenues not collected on those deferrals at 53¢/$100 assessed value.
The total "look-back" time for deferred recapture is limited to 5 prior years.
Any recapture of deferred tax revenues for lands discounted as "use valuation" assessments, is LIMITED to the amount of "deferred" tax revenues plus 10% simple (not compounded) interest per year, ONLY for the 5 prior years. Any deferral beyond 5 years is permanently lost.
As of December 31, 2009, there were at least 1977 parcels of varying sizes qualified for land-use tax deferrals. By those, there were 34,942 acres in the “Agricultural” deferral system, assessed at the lesser value of $220/acre, 67,677 acres in the "Forest" deferral system, assessed at the lesser value of $613/acre, and 67 acres in the "Horticultural" (e.g., vinyard) deferral system assessed at the lesser value of $400/acre. "Agricultural" and "Horticultural" uses must aggregate 5 acres minimum per application, and "Forest" use must aggregate 20 acres minimum. A single application can incorporate multiple adjacent otherwise-qualifying parcels owned by the same applicant.
Medians are much more statistically valid than "averages," and they are defined as the "midpoint" (half above and half below). The MEDIAN "Agricultural" acreage approved per application is 12.4 acres, the MEDIAN "Agricultural" value deferred was $140,380, and the MEDIAN deferred "Agricultural" tax revenues forgiven were $744. The MEDIAN "Forest" acreage per application is 20.74 acres, the MEDIAN "Forest" value deferred was $120,837, and the MEDIAN deferred "Agricultural" tax revenues forgiven were $640. The single "Horticultural" acreage approved in 2009 was 57 acres (added to 10 acres approved earlier), and its deferred value was $206,776, yielding deferred tax revenues forgiven of $1,096.
In all, there are currently in Goochland County 969 new and renewed deferral "accounts" each valued at or below $200,000, aggregating DEFERRED values of $101,934,200. There are 338 accounts each valued between $200,001 and $300,000, aggregating DEFERRED values of $82,742,300. There are 185 accounts each valued between $300,001 and $400,000, aggregating DEFERRED values of $63,822,100. There are 103 accounts each valued between $400,001 and $500,000, aggregating DEFERRED values of $46,392,100; and there are only 379 accounts each valued over $500,000, aggregating DEFERRED values of $454,444,700. The midpoint of the total deferred values is $374,667,700, which means that more than half of the aggregate deferred valuation is the upper 82% of the accounts exceeding the $500,000 valuation each. The midpoint of the total number of separate accounts is 987, which includes all the accounts of the lowest-valued parcels (under $200,000) plus just 18 more accounts in the next-higher category of $201,000 to $300,000. This seems to establish that the primary tax-deferral benefit under the current program disproportionately favors the higher-valued accounts.
All of us other Goochland County taxpayers presumably paid the 53¢/$100 tax rate based upon the full fair-market assessed values of their properties, including those whose lands are used for conservation but not otherwise qualifying as "Agricultural," "Horticultural" or "Forest."
(FULL DISCLOSURE: this writer owns approximately 45 acres currently in conservation use and, therefore, not qualifying for any land-tax subsidies.)
Virginia law limits localities primarily to levying or collecting land taxes, personal-property taxes, business licenses and sales taxes. A local income tax would arguably make more sense these days instead of the land tax, but it is not allowed under the "Dillon Rule" and state law. The total land tax ($24.9 Million in FY 2009-10) accounts for almost 40% of Goochland County's total budget ($62.5 Million for FY 2009-10), approximately half of which is allocated to education, the real estate tax thus amounting to almost 80% of education expenses. To the extent that some large landowners are excused from paying land taxes on full valuations, it MUST be made up by nonqualifying taxpayers (such as homeowners, business owners and conservationists) whose land taxes are assessed on full values.
The primary arguments heard by this writer in defense of the land-use tax deferrals are that "corn" and "cows" and "trees" don't send children to the public schools, that the reduced tax burden facilitates otherwise unprofitable farming, and that the potential recapture of the deferrals inhibits development of desirable open spaces arguably enjoyed by all.
Although some modest-income folks will surely be harshly squeezed by a moratorium on or repeal of the land-use-tax deferrals, and the few legitimate farmers will be forced to pay taxes on full land values thereby, this writer is mostly unimpressed by those arguments. Most developers will not be inhibited from paying the 5-year recapture costs as they are a "drop in the bucket" compared to development costs overall. They are simply not an effective deterrent to development if a parcel be otherwise desirable. Developers will seek to develop whatever acreage suits their purposes and those recapture costs are passed through to the lot purchasers.
This writer also believes that relatively little of the deferred acreage in Goochland is being operated at a profit anyway. Instead, most Goochland and central Virginia farms seem to be "hobby farms," defined here as farms and lands INTENTIONALLY operated at a loss to offset taxable income from other sources, such as dividends and capital gains. The US Internal Revenue Code requires farms to show a profit only any 2 out of every 7 years. According to Va. Employment Commission statistics, only 81 out of almost 11,000 workers in Goochland County are employed in agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting combined. Though there are a lot of tax-subsidized Goochland acres in farming or woodlands, that is a miniscule portion of the total Goochland County workforce. Can it, therefore, be said that Goochland is REALLY an "agricultural" community?
While true that "corn," "cows" and "trees" do not, per se, burden the public schools, neither do business properties send kids to the public schools, yet they pay taxes on the full fair-market value of those properties. The imposition of a relatively higher tax burden on homeowners and business owners (many of whom do not have kids in the schools) nevertheless amounts to an unseemly "use fee" imposed on such taxpayers for their non-use of the public schools. A tax break or reduction for some is ALWAYS an additional tax burden for others.
No taxpayer should fail to take advantage of any tax break or reduction legally allowed; however, given the very difficult budgetary choices now being faced by Goochland County departments and officials (like police, fire and rescue services, currently cut to the bone), the question is begged as to whether it makes good economic sense AT THIS TIME to allow such arbitrary tax subsidies to relatively few, mostly well-off landowners in this current atmosphere of severe budget belt-tightening.
(FULL DISCLOSURE: this writer serves, without compensation, an organization that receives the benefit of County tax revenues for services rendered.)
The Board of Supervisors should immediately move to recapture the $4 Million+ "deferral" in the upcoming budget by revoking or suspending the land-use-tax deferrals and instead use those revenues to fully fund needed County services in FY 2010-11. Any taxpayer not eligible for the substantial subsidies of land-use-tax deferrals should demand it. Any Supervisor currently taking advantage of the land-use-tax deferrals should abstain from debating or voting thereon due to an obvious conflict of interest.
SOURCES: The Goochland Co. Commissioner of Revenue, the Va. Dept. of Taxation, the Goochland County Website, the Weldon Cooper Center Website, and the Va. Employment Commission Website.
The writer, a resident of Goochland County, Virginia since 1998, has been in the general practice of law for over 36 years and was a brief, skeptical member of the original land-use tax deferral "committee" in Orange County, Virginia many years ago. He is also a diplomate of the Va. Tech Planning Commission Certification Program and also the Va. Tech Board of Zoning Appeals Certification Program.
All rights reserved.
[This was originally submitted to the Goochland (County, Va.) Gazette, which chose to ignore it.]
FOUR MILLION DOLLARS!
That's right: almost $4 Million is what was NOT collected in 2008 in Goochland County land taxes because of the Land-Use Tax deferral program that has been in place for about 30 years. The "nick" for 2009 is probably a bit higher.
BUT--those monies are not being forfeited into thin air by the County. The County gets its "pound of flesh" from other taxpayers: homeowners and business owners, for example. Because, what is NOT collected from one place MUST be collected from some other place, regardless of what the County is spending, because the County cannot print its own money. There is no "free lunch" in Goochland County.
Here are some interesting recent facts about the land-use tax "deferrals" in Goochland County:
The aggregate "deferred" land values are over $749 Million.
Almost $4 Million were the tax revenues not collected on those deferrals at 53¢/$100 assessed value.
The total "look-back" time for deferred recapture is limited to 5 prior years.
Any recapture of deferred tax revenues for lands discounted as "use valuation" assessments, is LIMITED to the amount of "deferred" tax revenues plus 10% simple (not compounded) interest per year, ONLY for the 5 prior years. Any deferral beyond 5 years is permanently lost.
As of December 31, 2009, there were at least 1977 parcels of varying sizes qualified for land-use tax deferrals. By those, there were 34,942 acres in the “Agricultural” deferral system, assessed at the lesser value of $220/acre, 67,677 acres in the "Forest" deferral system, assessed at the lesser value of $613/acre, and 67 acres in the "Horticultural" (e.g., vinyard) deferral system assessed at the lesser value of $400/acre. "Agricultural" and "Horticultural" uses must aggregate 5 acres minimum per application, and "Forest" use must aggregate 20 acres minimum. A single application can incorporate multiple adjacent otherwise-qualifying parcels owned by the same applicant.
Medians are much more statistically valid than "averages," and they are defined as the "midpoint" (half above and half below). The MEDIAN "Agricultural" acreage approved per application is 12.4 acres, the MEDIAN "Agricultural" value deferred was $140,380, and the MEDIAN deferred "Agricultural" tax revenues forgiven were $744. The MEDIAN "Forest" acreage per application is 20.74 acres, the MEDIAN "Forest" value deferred was $120,837, and the MEDIAN deferred "Agricultural" tax revenues forgiven were $640. The single "Horticultural" acreage approved in 2009 was 57 acres (added to 10 acres approved earlier), and its deferred value was $206,776, yielding deferred tax revenues forgiven of $1,096.
In all, there are currently in Goochland County 969 new and renewed deferral "accounts" each valued at or below $200,000, aggregating DEFERRED values of $101,934,200. There are 338 accounts each valued between $200,001 and $300,000, aggregating DEFERRED values of $82,742,300. There are 185 accounts each valued between $300,001 and $400,000, aggregating DEFERRED values of $63,822,100. There are 103 accounts each valued between $400,001 and $500,000, aggregating DEFERRED values of $46,392,100; and there are only 379 accounts each valued over $500,000, aggregating DEFERRED values of $454,444,700. The midpoint of the total deferred values is $374,667,700, which means that more than half of the aggregate deferred valuation is the upper 82% of the accounts exceeding the $500,000 valuation each. The midpoint of the total number of separate accounts is 987, which includes all the accounts of the lowest-valued parcels (under $200,000) plus just 18 more accounts in the next-higher category of $201,000 to $300,000. This seems to establish that the primary tax-deferral benefit under the current program disproportionately favors the higher-valued accounts.
All of us other Goochland County taxpayers presumably paid the 53¢/$100 tax rate based upon the full fair-market assessed values of their properties, including those whose lands are used for conservation but not otherwise qualifying as "Agricultural," "Horticultural" or "Forest."
(FULL DISCLOSURE: this writer owns approximately 45 acres currently in conservation use and, therefore, not qualifying for any land-tax subsidies.)
Virginia law limits localities primarily to levying or collecting land taxes, personal-property taxes, business licenses and sales taxes. A local income tax would arguably make more sense these days instead of the land tax, but it is not allowed under the "Dillon Rule" and state law. The total land tax ($24.9 Million in FY 2009-10) accounts for almost 40% of Goochland County's total budget ($62.5 Million for FY 2009-10), approximately half of which is allocated to education, the real estate tax thus amounting to almost 80% of education expenses. To the extent that some large landowners are excused from paying land taxes on full valuations, it MUST be made up by nonqualifying taxpayers (such as homeowners, business owners and conservationists) whose land taxes are assessed on full values.
The primary arguments heard by this writer in defense of the land-use tax deferrals are that "corn" and "cows" and "trees" don't send children to the public schools, that the reduced tax burden facilitates otherwise unprofitable farming, and that the potential recapture of the deferrals inhibits development of desirable open spaces arguably enjoyed by all.
Although some modest-income folks will surely be harshly squeezed by a moratorium on or repeal of the land-use-tax deferrals, and the few legitimate farmers will be forced to pay taxes on full land values thereby, this writer is mostly unimpressed by those arguments. Most developers will not be inhibited from paying the 5-year recapture costs as they are a "drop in the bucket" compared to development costs overall. They are simply not an effective deterrent to development if a parcel be otherwise desirable. Developers will seek to develop whatever acreage suits their purposes and those recapture costs are passed through to the lot purchasers.
This writer also believes that relatively little of the deferred acreage in Goochland is being operated at a profit anyway. Instead, most Goochland and central Virginia farms seem to be "hobby farms," defined here as farms and lands INTENTIONALLY operated at a loss to offset taxable income from other sources, such as dividends and capital gains. The US Internal Revenue Code requires farms to show a profit only any 2 out of every 7 years. According to Va. Employment Commission statistics, only 81 out of almost 11,000 workers in Goochland County are employed in agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting combined. Though there are a lot of tax-subsidized Goochland acres in farming or woodlands, that is a miniscule portion of the total Goochland County workforce. Can it, therefore, be said that Goochland is REALLY an "agricultural" community?
While true that "corn," "cows" and "trees" do not, per se, burden the public schools, neither do business properties send kids to the public schools, yet they pay taxes on the full fair-market value of those properties. The imposition of a relatively higher tax burden on homeowners and business owners (many of whom do not have kids in the schools) nevertheless amounts to an unseemly "use fee" imposed on such taxpayers for their non-use of the public schools. A tax break or reduction for some is ALWAYS an additional tax burden for others.
No taxpayer should fail to take advantage of any tax break or reduction legally allowed; however, given the very difficult budgetary choices now being faced by Goochland County departments and officials (like police, fire and rescue services, currently cut to the bone), the question is begged as to whether it makes good economic sense AT THIS TIME to allow such arbitrary tax subsidies to relatively few, mostly well-off landowners in this current atmosphere of severe budget belt-tightening.
(FULL DISCLOSURE: this writer serves, without compensation, an organization that receives the benefit of County tax revenues for services rendered.)
The Board of Supervisors should immediately move to recapture the $4 Million+ "deferral" in the upcoming budget by revoking or suspending the land-use-tax deferrals and instead use those revenues to fully fund needed County services in FY 2010-11. Any taxpayer not eligible for the substantial subsidies of land-use-tax deferrals should demand it. Any Supervisor currently taking advantage of the land-use-tax deferrals should abstain from debating or voting thereon due to an obvious conflict of interest.
SOURCES: The Goochland Co. Commissioner of Revenue, the Va. Dept. of Taxation, the Goochland County Website, the Weldon Cooper Center Website, and the Va. Employment Commission Website.
The writer, a resident of Goochland County, Virginia since 1998, has been in the general practice of law for over 36 years and was a brief, skeptical member of the original land-use tax deferral "committee" in Orange County, Virginia many years ago. He is also a diplomate of the Va. Tech Planning Commission Certification Program and also the Va. Tech Board of Zoning Appeals Certification Program.
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